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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25854058">Wolverine</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/chezchuckles/pseuds/chezchuckles'>chezchuckles</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Trauma Spy [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Castle (TV 2009)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, the dog has issues settling, wolf - Freeform</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 00:29:20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>33,765</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25854058</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/chezchuckles/pseuds/chezchuckles</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Wolf, their adopted dog-wolf, has issues settling in with the family at their home, and Kate relates all too well to that wildness. When Wolf leaves the house and disappears into the woods, Kate goes after him.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kate Beckett &amp; Richard Castle, Kate Beckett/Richard Castle</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Trauma Spy [6]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1821298</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>37</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Chapter 1</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>-----</p><p>"How long has he been out there?" Castle called to her.</p><p>She glanced up from Wyatt's avid babbling, pressing the boy's hands down and out of her face. "Almost three hours," she answered. "You think that's too long?"</p><p>"For a pup?" He rubbed the back of his neck. "I don't know. He does belong out there, really, but he's still a little guy."</p><p>Wyatt echoed his daddy, calling out sounds urgently into their silence. She glanced down at her son, wondered suddenly if his babbling wasn't at all about the coloring book she was trying to force him to do.</p><p>"Shit," she muttered. "Wyatt's been agitated."</p><p>"We don't know that Wyatt really has-"</p><p>"We don't know he doesn't, either," she answered. "Where's James?"</p><p>"He fell asleep already. At least one of them wants to nap."</p><p>She combed her fingers through the flop of Wyatt's straw-colored hair. His eyes were mulish, his jaw set. "You look like Daddy," she murmured and kissed his nose.</p><p>"That's sweet," Castle said, a little wry. "But Wolf?"</p><p>"Maybe we should go looking for him?"</p><p>"He won't come to me," he answered.</p><p>"Yeah," she murmured, glancing back down to Wyatt. "He'll come to me."</p><p>Castle moved away from the French doors and squatted down with them, leaning into the coffee table. "Wy, you wanna color with me? Mommy has to go get Wolf."</p><p>"Uff, Daddy." Wyatt patted his father's knee. "Daddy, me."</p><p>"That's right. You and me. And Mom-" Castle glanced at her and then swiveled his head back to the encroaching sunset. "Actually, Mom. I need to give you something."</p><p>She straightened up, eyebrow lifting, and Castle rose to his feet and disappeared back to the bedroom. She followed, frowning as she saw him head for the safe.</p><p>"Castle-"</p><p>"Not sure what's out there, baby," he cut in. "And so." He opened the safe with a press of thumb and the door popped and pushed open. When he reached inside, he pulled out his Glock. “Take this with you.”</p><p>She was handling the weapon before she knew she had reached for it, and when its cold metal touched her skin, she stiffened. “No.”</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“Castle.”</p><p>“There are predators,” he said carefully. “And I can’t go with you. Wolf would never come to you if I’m there. Especially if he’s been taken wild.”</p><p>She shivered and kept the weapon pointing down, a sudden thick choke of panic in her throat. “I can’t - there are - Wyatt is right out there.”</p><p>“You won’t shoot him.”</p><p>“Oh, God-”</p><p>He caught her shoulders and pulled her into him. “Bad joke. My fault. Tell me to shut up.”</p><p>“Shut up.” She moaned and buried her face into his neck, but she was hyper aware of the weight of the weapon at her thigh.</p><p>“But nonetheless true,” he whispered. His mouth touched her jaw just before her ear. “Let me get the strap on.”</p><p>“One day,” she croaked, giving him back his joke.</p><p>He did laugh, soft as it was, like he didn’t want to make any sudden movements and scare her. “Promises, promises,” he finished it out. He was heading for the panic room, which was open - he must have been going through the security feeds after the storm had taken one of the networks offline last night. </p><p>She stayed where she was, rooted to the wooden floor by the weapon in her hand and her son in the living room. When Castle came back through, he had the black neoprene holster that fitted to her thigh, and he was sliding off the knife sheath for the gun holster.</p><p>He changed it out, and then he was kneeling before her, placing a kiss to her groin in that lewd way he had sometimes, that always made her stomach jump and her guts twist. He made her step into the straps and then he slid it up over her knee, fingers teasing at her inside thigh.</p><p>He tightened the straps and made sure the velcro held, and then he cupped her ass and squeezed. “Try that out. Holster it and pull on the draw.”</p><p>She teased the barrel into the holster and it pushed down easily, fit snug. Castle’s face was dark with the eroticism of the movement, and she felt it too, winding in her belly like a snake.</p><p>“Draw, Beckett.”</p><p>She released the butt of the weapon and took a neutral stance, and then she darted her hand down and pulled the Glock up to a shooting stance.</p><p>Castle grinned. “Good girl. Now go hunt the wolf.”</p><p>She had to admit it felt better holstered. It was a tool that way, and not a deadly extension of her crazy.</p><p>It was locked down. Therefore she was locked down.</p><p>She knew believing it was half the battle.</p><p>“Sun has started to set, Beckett. Losing daylight. Go.”</p><p>She nodded and turned, but he caught her harshly by her elbow and hauled her back into his chest. For one terrible second, rage erupted like a solar flare in her chest and pushed out of her eyes, her fingers, her mouth-</p><p>But then he was kissing her, raw and needy, and the rage burst into feeling, that rush of pure lustful joy that whited out the rest.</p><p>And then he had set her back on her feet and she was turning, mindlessly, for the living room and the doors leading to the backyard.</p><p>-----</p><p>She didn’t have a plan so much as a vague determination to head for the river that cut through their property.</p><p>(Their. When had she taken on this place as her own? She lived here; she was resigned to that reality. But now ownership had crowded out the reluctance and the fear both.)</p><p>She skimmed her fingers along the trees, leaving her scent along the bark. She planted a hand on the massive felled tree that always served as her landmark when she went through these woods, and she had to half-vault herself over, swinging her legs and turning to hop down.</p><p>Her shoes crunched on dead leaves and thin grass, acorns and sticks. It was dark under the trees, the last of the afternoon light was barely reaching the forest floor. It was beginning to feel like autumn now, the trees releasing their leaves, the scent of smoke somehow in the air.</p><p>She moved as silently as she knew how, but not worried too much about making noise. She wanted to scare away critters, other predators; that was the point of noise in the leaves. But at the same time, she didn’t want to scare the cub if he was on the edge.</p><p>She knew how that felt.</p><p>Even in the darkness, she wasn’t afraid. Alone, nothing penetrated that far, nothing touched her. She had a gun. She had only herself. Everything she struggled against wasn’t here, it was back there, it was all of the consequences of her being dangerous to them. </p><p>Out here, she wasn’t a danger to anyone.  </p><p>Colin had said something at dinner the other day about building a tree stand. At the time, knowing how both of them hated to hunt animals, it had sounded to her like an excuse for two grown men to play tree house. But she had to admit, walking through the dim light under the trees, it would be nice to have a platform to hide away in.</p><p>And the boys might really love it, considering how much they all gravitated towards the woods. Despite herself, despite how much easier it would be to walk off into the woods and never return, she hadn’t survived three years and made the choices she’d made to not have her sons.</p><p>To see them enjoy a tree house or witness their learning new things. Wyatt’s tantrums couldn’t compare to his laughter; James’s shy attempts to gain her attention were joy itself. In her right mind, she craved those boys - and their father - fiercely. It was only when reality had sunk her so low, when the fear had become the greatest thing in her heart, that she believed the things she craved would only be damaged by her presence.</p><p>This was her first autumn out. She was out of that facility, and most importantly - so were those boys. Free. </p><p>God. Some days it seemed a trick, exchanging one prison for another, this one invisible and insidious. The deceit of family who weren’t really hers.</p><p>At least today she felt like she could do it. Build herself back, better this time, stronger. More. She wasn’t the girl who’d been ripped from her dying mother’s side, ignorant and naive and spoiled. What she was now - that was still being created, and maybe, yeah, it could go either way.</p><p>She could be fine. Or. She could crash and burn and bring them all down with her.</p><p>At the river, Kate paused before the foot bridge - more engineering the brothers had accomplished together. She watched the water move over rocks, eddying near the banks, slower moving now as the season went dry. The lower volume made the river somewhere between river and stream, though its power was still undeniable. </p><p>Somewhere between two existences, somewhere in limbo, neither river nor stream, but look at all that power. She had that too, the power for good, power for such terrible bad. </p><p>She was so stuck in her own thoughts that it took a while to understand what it was she’d walked into the middle of. It was only when she began to cross the bridge, she finally heard it.</p><p>The baying of wolves very close by.</p><p>And the painfully high yip of the puppy, his voice encompassing all of the longing for home and mother that Kate pretended she never had.</p><p>-----</p><p>She moved forward swiftly, but she tried to be careful too. She had the gun in her hand as she came down the bridge and started up the ridge towards the darkness of the closest set trees. The saplings on the ridge were thin, but she used them as a kind of stepladder to scramble upwards.</p><p>At the top, she couldn’t see through the dense woods to know what she was approaching, but she could hear it. The wolves were moving farther away, and she thought she could make out the slink of their shadows as they left. They didn’t like to be driven out of their territory, and Castle had mounted motion-activated cameras which showed them this area was regularly part of their run.</p><p>But she had gone farther into the darkness than she’d ever roamed when she realized she could smell it.</p><p>Blood. Violence.</p><p>She paused, putting her shoulder to a tree trunk, wishing she’d brought a damn flashlight. The sun was gone; she’d been out here forty minutes or so. She couldn’t see shit, but-</p><p>There. The gleam of animal eyes low to the ground.</p><p>Kate darted forward. “Wolf,” she called softly. “Wolf, with me. With me.” The commands came easily after all their work with the puppy and the vet and their training, but those eyes remained steady.</p><p>Absolutely steady.</p><p>And then she heard the pained whine of Wolf coming from the same direction as those staring eyes. Wolf crying for her.</p><p>The eyes moved towards her, but that wasn’t Wolf.</p><p>She stopped dead still, brought the gun into a triangle formation, steadying the butt of the weapon with both hands. She breathed slowly, watching the animal advance, and it was only when it had cleared the trees that she got her first look at it.</p><p>Skunk-sized, but its paws held vicious claws. Ears round on either side, muzzle like a bear, and that same shaggy fur. A weasel face, shrewd, a lot more calculating than she liked, and as it began to pick up speed, it rushed straight for her, teeth bared as it widened its jaw, screaming at her.</p><p>She lifted the weapon, aimed without thinking, and fired.</p><p>The animal’s chest exploded in gristle - bone and blood - and its body flipped backward and struck the tree. </p><p>Her heart was thundering as she lowered the gun. When she cautiously approached the thing, she nudged the body with her toe. It was dead. Claws, teeth, a ring of white fur at its broad shoulders. It looked like a bear even as it reminded her of a skunk.</p><p>And then came Wolf’s whimpering cry.</p><p>She turned abruptly and began scanning the underbrush, moving towards where the animal had come from. “Wolf. Hey, Wolf, it’s okay. It’s okay. I’m coming.”</p><p>The wolves were still here, circling the area, wanting their territory back. She was - faintly concerned by the fact that this animal had run off an entire wolf pack, but she was aware. She was listening. She thought that had been the only one.</p><p>She tripped over something in the underbrush and had to catch herself on a tree, knelt down with sick fear sliding through her guts. When she pushed aside the leaves, the gore was incredible.</p><p>But it wasn’t her Wolf. It was the carcass of a deer, throat ripped out by the wolves, but evidence of predation here at the guts that told her they hadn’t finished feeding.</p><p>Wolf had come after the pack during its hunt and then...</p><p>That thing.</p><p>“Wolf,” she whispered. “With me, Wolf. Please, honey. You’re safe now. Wolf? It’s-”</p><p>She startled as the brush rustled, fell back on her ass when the animal came bounding out of its hiding place. </p><p>She took it full in the chest and shoulders, her head slamming into a tree as it rocked her back. </p><p>Tongue licked her face, hot and wet, that urgent whining in her ear as its body squirmed.</p><p>She let out a breath and wrapped her free arm around him. “Wolf. Oh God. Okay, okay. It’s okay. Come on, cub, you’re okay.”</p><p>But he wasn’t. She felt where blood was sticky and warm and soaking her shirt, and when she moved to stand, he whined and jerked in her arms.</p><p>“Okay, it’s okay,” she whispered, her face close to his ruff. He licked her like a puppy, like the puppy he wasn’t, and she slowly got to her feet.</p><p>She holstered the gun and hoped the wolves stayed away.</p><p>-----</p><p>She kept Wolf close to her body, breathing hard as she jogged down the slope towards the river. Wolf hadn’t stopped licking her, so relieved to be carried away, but she knew she was hurting him as she took the hill so fast.</p><p>At the bridge, where the river pushed the trees aside and allowed a little more light into the woods, Kate squatted down and carefully eased Wolf away from her chest. </p><p>He whimpered and bared his teeth, but she ran her fingers through his pelt, searching for the source of the blood. Sticky hopefully meant it was already clotting. The fur was matted but just under his neck, she felt the give of an open wound.</p><p>Wolf yelped and scratched at her as his back legs kicked, but she barely felt it. </p><p>“It’s okay, I won’t. It’s okay,” she told him soothingly. She thought it was just a gash, it might even heal without stitches. The majority of this blood was probably from the deer killed by the pack. “Did you try to go home, Wolf? Poor thing. They left you to that nasty animal, didn’t they?”</p><p>Wolf whined and buried his nose in her crotch, making her huff, a kind of relieved laughter spilling out of her.</p><p>“Okay, okay. Sorry, Wolf, but we need to get you home. Let Castle take a look at you, fix you up.”</p><p>Poor thing, despite his small size, was fairly awkward and heavy to carry all the way back, but she didn’t see any other option. </p><p>And she heard the wolf pack out there still, circling and circling. They must have scented the animal’s death, or the gunpowder, something, and they could hear that the puppy was wounded.</p><p>All not good.</p><p>Kate eased her arm under Wolf’s spine and gathered his back legs with one hand, just like the vet had taught her. With his paws restrained by her hand, and his body tucked into her chest and banded by her arm, she lifted him up as she stood.</p><p>Wolf whimpered, but he was still licking her neck.</p><p>“Okay, let’s head home.” She had to brace the puppy with her other arm, but if push came to shove, she could get to the gun.</p><p>That was important.</p><p>As the sky grew darker, twilight giving way to night, she walked back through woods she considered more familiar. There was something like a path that she and Castle had made with their constant forays out here, and the makeshift shooting gallery where Colin made her practice with firearms was close as well.</p><p>She had just passed the targets, crossing the wide clearing that Castle and Colin had both made her swear to never do, when she heard Castle bellowing her name from the direction of the house.</p><p>“Castle!” she called out.</p><p>“Beckett!”</p><p>“Shooting range,” she shouted. She realized she was breathing hard, her arms cramped from trying to keep the puppy in her arms. Wolf was squirming with her every step, no doubt in pain, trying to flip out of her hold. It took effort to keep him against her chest, and she was damn grateful that Castle was out here.</p><p>She sank back against the locked wooden crate that served as a storage locker, weather-proofed as it was, and she waited for Castle to find them.</p><p>When he came through the trees and stepped off the path, she saw horror streak across his face.</p><p>“It’s not my blood,” she croaked, a little dizzy with the way he looked at her. “Not his either.”</p><p>“Fuck,” he whispered, hurrying towards them. </p><p>Wolf whined, but Kate shushed him, using her free hand to muzzle him.  </p><p>Castle approached a little more slowly, though she could see the urgency on his face. He cupped her elbows and stared at her. “I heard the gunshot.”</p><p>“Oh, shit,” she answered. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what the hell that was, but it was an animal. Going for the deer the wolves brought down.”</p><p>“The wolves brought down a deer?” He looked impressed. Understanding dawned on his face, and he carefully stroked the top of Wolf’s head. “Oh. And he tried to get back to them. Ah, Wolf. I’m sorry. Can’t go home again, wild thing.”</p><p>Now that Castle was here and stationary, she slowly released Wolf’s muzzle. The little cub whined and licked Castle’s wrist and fingers, then turned into her and licked her neck and jaw, paws scrabbling at her collarbones.</p><p>“Are you bleeding? Is he?” Castle said softly. “Here, honey, let me take him. Wolf, with me.”</p><p>The puppy whimpered and yelped as she transferred him to Castle’s arms. Big bad soldier cradling a half-wolf against his chest. She bit her lip. “You guys look cute.”</p><p>Castle rolled his eyes. “Go ahead of me on the path. Get the garden door open.”</p><p>She grinned because his ears were pink, and she leaned in over the wolf to kiss Castle’s chin. “Sorry I scared you.”</p><p>“Uh-huh. Did you just walk across the shooting range? Right between the targets and the firing point stands?”</p><p>She winced and opened her mouth to defend herself.</p><p>But Castle growled and Wolf growled back.</p><p>She laughed. “Okay, fine. But I knew you were in the house with the boys and Colin is gone again, so-”</p><p>“Colin could’ve come back and started shooting,” he muttered.</p><p>“I’d have heard it.”</p><p>“Damn it, Kate. You can’t go through the fucking shooting range!” </p><p>Wolf snapped his teeth and jerked his hind legs, which only caused him pain, making him whimper.</p><p>Kate petted him down, soothing his defense of her, and quirked her eyebrow at Castle.</p><p>“Fine. But I’m not letting this one go.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “March, Beckett. Back to the house.”</p><p>“Yes, sir.” She even saluted.</p><p>He growled, Wolf growled, and she laughed and turned to go ahead of them. She knew that after they took care of the wolf-dog, he was going to impress upon her the importance of his gun safety rules.</p><p>With his body.</p><p>-----</p><p>While Castle went upstairs for the boys - he had apparently dropped Wyatt into James’s bed and shut the gates on them - Kate changed out of her bloody clothes. She had to use a wash cloth to wipe the blood and guts from her skin, all along her neck, wincing at the sting.</p><p>Wolf whimpered from the bathtub, scrabbling at the sides with his claws.</p><p>She turned away from the bathroom mirror and leaned over the side, put her hand out flat. Wolf whined but he followed her instructions, lowering his belly to the bottom of the tub. She reached in and stroked the top of his head softly, around his eyes, under his muzzle where he liked it best, where it reminded him of who was in charge.</p><p>“There you go, Wolf. Stay quiet, stay calm.” She knelt beside the bathtub in her bra and panties, petting the scared puppy, and that was how Castle found her.</p><p>“Alright, that’s a show.”</p><p>She turned and rolled her eyes at him, but two little heads poked past his knees, the boys gripping his pants. Castle had pulled on a clean shirt, though his hands were still grimy from carrying the puppy.</p><p>“Mommy?” James wriggled past Castle and came into the bathroom, his rag doll clutched under one arm. </p><p>She held out a hand for him. “Hey, baby. Wolf got hurt. Did you have a good nap?”</p><p>James came running into her, colliding so that she was knocked back into the tub. Her hand on Wolf was jostled, and the puppy whined, causing James to lift his head curiously, little eyebrows raised.</p><p>“Here, take a look,” she murmured, shifting to stand with James in her arms. She let him peer into the bathtub and he seemed to understand, making sympathetic noises.</p><p>“Kate?” Castle came up to her. “Clothes, honey.” He had a pair of jeans and a t-shirt in his hands, and she nodded, exchanging the boy for clean clothes.</p><p>She pulled on her jeans quickly, not wanting Wolf to think she had gone, while Castle herded the boys away from the bathroom with promises of a snack. While he got the boys settled, Kate dressed and leaned in over the tub.</p><p>“Hey, Wolf. Don’t be scared.” But now the puppy was whimpering and shaking in the bottom of the bath, and she couldn’t stand it. Grabbing a towel, she climbed into the tub with him, wrapping the wolfdog in the material to both keep him still, comforted, and also to avoid getting her clothes dirty.</p><p>Castle came back, the first aid kit under his arm, but he came to a halt in the bathroom and shook his head. “Course. Of course. You and that wolf.”</p><p>She bit her lip and studied the poor puppy cowled in her arms. “Yeah. I know.”</p><p>“Don’t sound that way,” he sighed. “Didn’t mean it was a bad thing, sweetheart.” He came on into the bathroom and sat down at the head of the bathtub, turned to put his feet into the tub against hers.</p><p>And then he sank down into the tub with them, his legs along her own. “I brought the electric razor too. Have to shave it so I can see to stitch him up.”</p><p>“I’ll shave-”</p><p>“No. You hold his jaw closed for me, honey. I’ll do the shaving.”</p><p>She scowled. “He’s going to scratch you up with his paws-”</p><p>“Yeah, he will. Like he’s done to your neck.” His toes nudged her thigh. “My turn now. Hold him?”</p><p>That he asked... she nodded and cradled Wolf between her thighs. She stroked his neck, just under his jaw, murmuring softly until the wolf in him began to ease. Not entirely gone, not when he was scared and wounded, but less hackles raised.</p><p>She circled his muzzle, thumb stroking the baby soft fur just over his lip, right at his bared teeth. He licked her, and his mouth closed of his own doing, as if in permission, so she tightened her fingers in a clamp around his muzzle.</p><p>“Okay, much better,” Castle said softly. He laid a hand on Wolf’s flank and the dog flinched, whimpering, rolling his eyes up to her.</p><p>“You’re okay. You’re gonna be just fine. My sweet puppy.” Wolf mewled at her, his back legs scrabbling against the tub as Castle maneuvered the razor closer and turned it on.</p><p>Wolf yipped from between her fingers, and she leaned in over him until she was the only thing he could see.</p><p>“Hey, Wolf. Hey, just look at me. You’re scared, I know, but it doesn’t have to be like that. You came running for me, didn’t you, cub? You came right back to me when you heard me calling you. You know I won’t let anything happen to you.”</p><p>Over the sound of the buzzing razor, she could feel and hear the vibrations of the wolf’s craven fear beginning to transform. She kept talking, even as Castle clicked off the electric shaver and began cleaning the wound.</p><p>After a time, even Wolf’s wriggling stopped. His eyes were fixed on her, his nostrils flaring as he breathed, and she slowly released his muzzle. He whined once, licked and then chewed on her finger, but the fight had gone out of him.</p><p>He laid in her lap and let it happen.</p><p>She realized after a while that she was crying.</p><p>-----</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Chapter 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The wound was just at Wolf’s neck, arrowing out to his shoulder. She had nearly her whole wrist in Wolf’s mouth, giving him something to taste and bite down on, though he wasn’t using his full force; he just needed the stress relief to siphon his anxiety. And this way, her thumb was near the back of his tongue, and if she had to, she could gag him and make him release her.</p><p>Only if she had to. The vet had taught her this trick, and she would teach it to the boys were they were old enough to understand, keep it in mind. </p><p>Wolf snapped his jaws when he was scared, or pushed too far too fast. She understood that.</p><p>Castle put in the last stitch and kept a hand cupped over the wound. “Stay just like that. I need to smear this jelly on it. Keep it clean.”</p><p>“He’ll be still,” she agreed, smoothing her free hand under Wolf’s muzzle. Soft, steady strokes. The cub looked hypnotized. “Won’t you, Wolf?”</p><p>A whine in response, like he understood her. Or at least knew the sound of his name.</p><p>“Lucky for you Wolf has dog teeth,” Castle muttered. No rancor in it, at least, just resignation. “Lucky for me, I should say. Since I’m the only one who seems to care how torn up you get. Baby, you have angry welts all down your neck.”</p><p>“I don’t feel them,” she answered, her eyes on the wolfdog in her lap. Keep him still, calm, while Castle daubed petroleum jelly onto the wound. </p><p>When she looked, she saw he had shaved a large area - from the top of his throat to the top of his chest - to keep the fur from getting in the wound or stitches. Dark black lines that looked more like a tree branch than a neat suture.</p><p>“Was it bad?” she murmured.</p><p>“Worse than I’d thought,” he said in return. He was leaned in over Wolf so that the dog’s back legs could on scrabble at his thighs, his ribs, not jostle Castle’s arms. “I’ll call the doc and get a round of antibiotics and - shit - probably rabies vaccination as well.”</p><p>“Oh, God. I didn’t think of that.” She grimaced and cupped the side of Wolf’s muzzle. “The animal might still be out there. Unless the wolves got it.”</p><p>“I’d be interested in knowing what kind of animal takes on a wolf pack,” he muttered. “I can think of a few, but you said this thing was small?”</p><p>“Like a weasel. Or a skunk.” She thought back and shook her head. “Or a tiny bear. That sounds really stupid, but-”</p><p>“A wolverine?” he exclaimed. His voice made Wolf whimper, and Castle hushed it with a soothing noise and a soft stroke down Wolf’s belly. “Sorry, sorry. A wolverine, Kate? Those usually range through Canada but I guess some could have come across the lake.”</p><p>“I don’t know what a wolverine is.”</p><p>“We’ll look it up,” he said. “After we clean this guy up. Wolf, you think you can stand?” He lifted his hands from Wolf’s body, and so did Kate, easing away from him, pulling the towel back from where she’d had him swaddled.</p><p>Wolf whined and yipped, his body contorting as he tried to get purchase in the tub and against their limbs. Castle withdrew first, climbing back over the rim, and Kate moved to follow, watching Wolf.</p><p>The poor thing tried to get at the wound first, but it was just under his neck and thankfully his tongue and teeth wouldn’t reach. </p><p>“We’re lucky in that too,” Castle murmured. “I don’t think Wolf would like that cone being put back on him.”</p><p>She laughed, a weak sound, but it made Wolf’s head come up and look at her. And then he flipped around and got on his feet, rising in the tub.</p><p>“Whew, he’s getting bigger and bigger,” Castle muttered. “Damn. Look at that. His head nearly clears the top now.”</p><p>She gaped at Wolf, realizing for the first time just how wolf he looked. “He could jump out if he wanted to. Even this deep tub. We can’t cage him in here any longer - wouldn’t work.”</p><p>Castle chuckled. “You’re right. Not a bit is this thing caged. Are you, Wolf?” Castle reached in and moved to pet the dog, but Wolf growled and shied back, a warning.</p><p>Kate sighed and moved to the edge of the tub, pulled her hand into a slow fist. “Sit.”</p><p>Wolf whined, his eyes sliding to Castle, but he sank to his haunches. His tail swished the sides of the tub, but his head was drooping.</p><p>“How about you hold his head up, and I’ll fill the bath with a couple inches of water. Shampoo him.”</p><p>“Yeah. You want to bring the boys in for this?”</p><p>“I guess we’re supposed to, aren’t we?” Castle rubbed the side of his jaw. “Yeah, damn. Gotta follow through. I’ll turn the water on, you shut it off when it’s enough? I’ll get the boys.”</p><p>“We can do that. Right, Wolf?” She opened her fist and he came bouncing right up, eager to be released, and she held his muzzle in her hand. “Castle, you’re supposed to pet him because he refused you.”</p><p>“Oh, yeah. Damn, I forgot.” Castle came back and moved his hand slowly for Wolf, smoothing two fingers up along his nose and between his eyes, back along his skull. This time Wolf shivered but actually closed his wolf eyes into the touch, and Kate released his muzzle.</p><p>Wolf whined and licked Castle’s wrist in apology.</p><p>“Good dog,” Castle whispered. He ducked over the animal and kissed the top of Wolf’s head. “I know you’re just scared. It’s okay. You didn’t do anything wrong.”</p><p>Kate swallowed hard, met Castle’s eyes as he lifted up again. He gave her a shrug and then came down to kiss her forehead too. </p><p>She sighed, her lashes brushing against his chin, and he cupped the back of her head for a moment, like he didn’t want to let go.</p><p>“You did good, Kate,” he murmured. </p><p>And then he was disappearing out the bathroom door to get the boys.</p><p>Kate turned her face back to Wolf and the water slowly trickling into the bathtub, feeling somehow numb, drained of everything.</p><p>And then Wolf licked her cheeks and she laughed, and he wolf-howled in response, licked her face again as he danced in the inch of water filling the tub.</p><p>-----</p><p>The boys peered over the edge of the bathtub, eager to see, and Wolf - with Kate’s hands holding his head up and subtly restraining him - nudged his nose into the boys’s faces, licked their ears, their hair, until they giggled and dropped back.</p><p>Wyatt was right at her side, leaning into her, hanging onto her shoulder for support. James, more stable, more confident in his gross motor skills, clambered over and around Castle, used the towel rack as a tree to climb, but he was always careful not to be in anyone’s way.</p><p>The boys were both so careful in their own way, careful not to be wrong, not to be in the way.</p><p>Kate turned her head and loudly kissed Wyatt’s cheek. He laughed so hard he toppled off her thigh and she had to catch him. Wolf yipped and licked her fingers in response, seeking her attention. Castle was rubbing down the dog’s pelt, the rough scrape of his thumbs and the heels of his hands bringing up grit in the suds still.</p><p>“You guys are all crazy, you know it?” Castle said, chuckling. “All of you. And getting so big. So much more adventurous. Be careful around his teeth, James.”</p><p>Jay’s fingers were reaching for the dog, but he withdrew, glanced back at his father with a solemn look. And then he turned to look at Wolf once more and shot his little arm out.</p><p>Wolf bared his teeth and curled his head back to James.</p><p>“No!” Kate commanded, squeezing under Wolf’s neck at his jaw. She felt the animal draw back, but he snapped his teeth in the air. </p><p>James whined and stretched his hand out to the dog.</p><p>“James,” she said softly, not taking her eyes off the wolf. Even Castle had stilled his work getting out the blood and dirt, but he gave her a noise of dislike. “James, come in over here and pet him. Castle. Help him follow through.”</p><p>Castle gave her a huff, but he removed his hands from Wolf and sloshed the suds off in the water before he turned to James. He picked the boy up, wrapped an arm around his torso, and let James lean over just enough to connect James’s fingers with the dog’s head.</p><p>James patted Wolf on the top of his head and even petted him a little, his face glowing with pleasure. Wyatt squirmed next to her and pushed up between her and the bathtub, using the back of her calf and the edge of the tub itself to maneuver his body closer.</p><p>“Wyatt,” she laughed softly. “Fine, you too. Pet the puppy.”</p><p>She kept her thumb and middle finger circled around the dog’s muzzle. With both boys crowding in, she was afraid it would be too much for Wolf.</p><p>But Wolf grew still, and sat in the bath water even though he hated it. His ears perked, laid back, and his tail drooped. The moment Wyatt’s fingers touched his head, Wolf went down into the sphinx sit, his tail dragging through the dirty water, wagging back and forth in actual happiness.</p><p>“Wow,” Castle muttered.</p><p>“No kidding. I haven’t even gotten Wolf to do that. He’s been passively submissive, but he’s never shown me happy. Damn. Good job, Wyatt. What a smart boy.”</p><p>“Me, me,” Wyatt said cheerfully. And then he lifted his hand over his head and smacked Wolf on the nose. </p><p>“Oh, shit, whoops,” Castle laughed, dragging both boys away as Wolf jerked to his feet and yipped at them. </p><p>Kate released Wolf’s muzzle and withdrew her hands, standing up to take Wyatt and James from Castle. “Can you rinse him and we’ll can be done?”</p><p>“Yeah.”</p><p>Wolf danced in the bathtub, circled and came to the edge, barking loud enough to echo on the tiles. He whined and licked the edge of the tub, his own nose, and pranced like a prissy thing to the other end. </p><p>“Well, hang on. Let’s see what happens,” Castle said. “Wyatt, you first. Come here, kid.” He took Wyatt’s hand from her and led the boy up to the bathtub, then hoisted him up to the edge. Wyatt’s feet were on the rim and he squatted there, reaching in for Wolf.</p><p>The animal came right up to him and licked messily around Wyatt’s fingers, then his face, making Wyatt giggle. She couldn’t be sure, but it sure looked like the dog was eager to prove himself.</p><p>James pushed his body back into her legs, wriggled between her knees until she could clamp down on him. James giggled and looked up at her, and she wondered if he was ‘helping’ Wolf settle down or if Wolf was doing it on his own.</p><p>James didn’t seem to be too tired. He didn’t seem to be focused on the dog at all.</p><p>She bent down and scooped him up into her arms. “I guess we’re making progress, aren’t we?” She glanced to Castle and he was smiling proudly.</p><p>“I think so. It’s really working.”</p><p>Wolf barked again and startled Wyatt, the two finally separating. But it had been successful all around.</p><p>“You know what?” Castle said, putting Wyatt on his feet beside her. “We should mark this. I mean, some way to show how far we’ve come. Like - look how damn big he is now.” Castle turned as if something had occurred to him, his eyes scanning the boys. “Shit. Look how big they are. Photos just...”</p><p>Kate bit her lip, rubbing Wyatt’s back as she watched Castle’s rather helpless look. “I - my parents used to mark my height on the wall. Just every year of growth. Started at two, I think, all these colorful marks against the wall. I remember rolling my eyes for the first time at like eleven when my dad pushed me against the kitchen pantry and used his red pen to mark it. They’d forgotten, were like a week late.”</p><p>Castle’s face broke open, lighting up almost as joyfully as Wyatt’s. “We could do that. All three of ‘em. Boys and dog.” His grin cracked his mouth and he reached out for her, yanked her into him, her and James both.</p><p>His kiss was rough, and it set the dog to barking, and James to giggling, and Wyatt to squirming in between their legs and trying to climb up.</p><p>But it was also hot and wild and happy, and it went right through her.</p><p>-----</p><p>She kept Wolf swaddled in a towel, but it was Castle that carried him into the kitchen. She and the boys trailed after, James for some reason carrying the dog’s collar and leash that they hadn’t yet been able to put on him.</p><p>“Where’d you get that, little bear?” She combed her fingers through his hair, and he tilted his head back to look at her. “Did Daddy give you that or did you find it?”</p><p>“Daddy.”</p><p>She laughed, surprised by such a direct answer, and glanced up to Castle. He was setting Wolf on his feet, rubbing him down with the towel. “Me? No. I didn’t give him that. He must’ve pulled it out from under the sink.” Castle straightened up and they all looked down at the poor, bedraggled Wolf. “Where do you want to mark their heights?”</p><p>She glanced around, scanning his gorgeous kitchen. “I don’t think... it’s just so beautiful in here.”</p><p>Castle scowled as his gaze followed hers. “It’s kinda stark. I mean, we just picked it out of a magazine for resale value.”</p><p>“Resale?” she gasped. “Are you selling it?”</p><p>“No, no. I mean - we didn’t really expect to live here.” Castle shrugged and scraped a hand down his face, dropped his arm to touch the top of Wyatt’s head, keeping him back from Wolf. “We started this project as a way to-” His jaw worked and his eyes met hers. “Keep Colin steady. You know? I never thought we’d ever actually finish it. And really - we were still working on the last of the garden project only three months before I brought you and the boys home.”</p><p>Her chest filled at the way he said that. Like it was a massive Before and After for him, like that was his line, whereas her own was-</p><p>“You’ve just built on it every so often until...?”</p><p>“Every winter,” he said, nodding. “Garden structure was done last winter. The planting was done in the spring. Last of it right before you got here.”</p><p>She glanced to Wolf, but the dog had his nose in the crack of the pantry door, smelling food. She gestured his way and Castle turned, chuckling as he opened the pantry. Wolf wriggled his way inside and jumped up, his paws on the lowest shelf, his teeth flashing as he grabbed for his food.</p><p>“Wolf,” she said sharply. “Down. Leave it.”</p><p>Wolf whined, yipped and flashed his teeth, but he dropped back down and lowered his belly to the floor, tail swishing like a dog.</p><p>Castle glanced to her, pulled the plastic container of mixed food from the shelf. “That went well.”</p><p>“Fix his food on the counter and then put it down on the other side. Not near him.”</p><p>Castle lifted an eyebrow. “Good idea.” He pulled the dog bowl from the drying rack; it was new and shiny green, never been used so far. Wolf had been outside for the last month, and then for the last week, he’d been inside only a few hours at a time.</p><p>Kate leaned over and softly petted Wolf between his ears, getting a nudge back into her hand when she tried to stop. James and Wyatt crept up, Wyatt hanging onto her jeans, James venturing out to pat Wolf’s side.</p><p>The dog let him.</p><p>“His first night with us,” Castle said. The food was made by hand, a combination of dry dog food and wet, pieces of chicken shredded into a venison broth. They were trying to curtail the blood lust, giving him a taste of wild game with a mostly domesticated filler. </p><p>“Yeah, first night,” she answered, keeping Wolf with her and the boys while Castle carried the dish to the other side of the bar. “That’s pretty momentous, actually.”</p><p>“I wish I’d gotten photos of the boys’ first night here. Or just - damn. Come on, Kate, where are we doing this?”</p><p>The second Kate let the wolf go, he was bounding up and rounding the bar, flying at his food. He let out a whimper, which she figured must be the stitches pulling as he swallowed, and then they could all hear the dog chomping down.</p><p>“How about the pantry door?” she said finally. “On the inside, where it won’t spoil the rest of the kitchen, but we’ll always see it.”</p><p>“On the inside,” he murmured, coming around the bar to meet them. “I don’t think - I don’t want to hide them, it’s not shameful-”</p><p>She shook her head and jumped up into his arms, wrapping herself around him. “I’m sorry. That’s not what I meant. I think it’s wonderful. Castle. You’re wonderful. But I don’t want you ruining our beautiful, gorgeous kitchen with three sets of timelines and their hash marks for the next - fuck - when do guys stop growing.”</p><p>“Our kitchen,” he breathed, hugging her hard against him. “Damn straight.”</p><p>She shivered, reminded of how fierce he was when he wanted to be. “Inside of the door?”</p><p>“Inside of the door, sweetheart.” His fingers came up and buried in her hair, tightened at the nape of her neck. “You’re gorgeous when you’re taking care of that damn dog, you know. So impressed with you.”</p><p>She nudged her cheek against his, body hot with it, flushed, and he chuckled and softly kissed the corner of her mouth.</p><p>“Damn, I think the boys are messing with Wolf while he eats.”</p><p>“Oh, shit.” She jerked away but Castle was already there, hauling James and Wyatt away from the wolf as he snarled into his food. </p><p>She sank back to the counter, heart thumping, but Castle was laughing - and so was Wyatt.</p><p>“You guys are gonna give us a heart attack, aren’t you?” she muttered, shaking her head at them. She squatted down and reached out for James, taking him into her arms. “Little stinker.”</p><p>“Int-er!”</p><p>Castle scooped up Wyatt and gave him a kiss against his belly. “That’s right. Wyatt is the turkey, and James is the stinker. I think that about sums it up.” </p><p>-----</p><p>Kate rubbed her fingers against the wood of the pantry door. It was beautiful, and she had the sense that it was hand-planed, milled nearby, that such love and craft had gone into it.</p><p>“Castle?”</p><p>He was rounding the bar with permanent markers in hand, three colors, black, red, and blue. “Which one for which? I had green somewhere but I can’t find it.”</p><p>“Did you and Colin make all of these doors?”</p><p>Castle dusted his knuckles to the top of Wyatt’s head. “Yeah. They’re all custom. We had to - the clearance is higher than most cause we’re tall.”</p><p>Her jaw dropped. “You made this door and you want to mark it up?”</p><p>“You said in the inside of the door. We could do the wall or-”</p><p>“You built all of this, Castle. I just - shit. I don’t want to ruin the beautiful things you’ve made, Rick.”</p><p>“I’d be proud,” he said softly. “To have them.” His eyes dropped from hers, and he glanced at the boys. “I think black for Wolf. Red for Wyatt. Blue for James. Seems like them.”</p><p>She chewed on her bottom lip, but she could already see it in her head, marking the boys’ heights for every birthday and half birthday, seeing how fast they sprouted up, when they might diverge, Castle nudging them back against the door and their little eyes lifting to try and see the mark as he made it.</p><p>“Okay,” she said finally. “James first. Alphabetical order.”</p><p>“Wolf last?” Castle grinned, squatting down before the door. “How do we label this?”</p><p>“You make the line on the door, write his age beside it, and then I guess what height or maybe the date?” She scowled, frustrated with herself for forgetting already, for not having a clear enough picture in her head of the pantry wall at home, and what those marks had actually said.</p><p>“Well, what do you want it to say?” Castle asked, uncapping the blue marker. He gestured for James to come to him, and Kate nudged the boy his way.</p><p>“Age and date,” she answered, nodding. “Jay, stand up against the door so Daddy can mark how tall you are.”</p><p>James cocked his head. “Daddy?”</p><p>Kate knelt down beside them, putting her knee behind the door to hold it still. Castle pushed James’s shoulders back to the door and the boy gave them curious looks but stayed where he was.</p><p>“Good job, baby,” she murmured, winking at him. She held him in place with a light hand at his belly.</p><p>Castle came up on his knees and touched the top of James’s head, flattening his palm so that his fingers hit the door. James, of course, immediately craned his neck and tilted his head back to see what his daddy was doing, but Castle had his hand steady and he used the blue Sharpie to mark off the line.<br/>Straight across.</p><p>He moved his hand and James wriggled free of Kate’s restraint, turning to look. </p><p>“That’s how tall you are, kiddo.” Castle wrote in careful script beside the line 16 months, October 17. He sank back on his heels with a satisfied grin, capping the marker. “Wyatt?”</p><p>Kate bit her lip, nudged Castle in the shoulder. “Maybe, I don’t know, write his name somewhere at the bottom?”</p><p>“Oh, shit, yeah.” Castle’s ears went pink and he popped the top off the Sharpie again. “Wait, here, you do it. You write their names under their growth charts.”</p><p>“Growth chart,” she echoed, realizing that was what it was called. “That’s it. How’d you know?”</p><p>“Know what?” </p><p>She balanced the marker in her fingers and glanced to the first mark they’d made. “That’s what my parents called it. I couldn’t remember, the word was escaping me. But - that’s it. Growth chart. For each of them.”</p><p>“Okay. Good. I must’ve heard it somewhere, I guess. I don’t know.”</p><p>She leaned in and caught the base of the door with two fingers to hold it steady for her hand, and then she sized up the space. Hesitating. She had never been the cheerleader making posters for the football team’s lockers, never the one hanging homecoming decorations. She wasn’t sure she could do this.</p><p>It was a lot of pressure.</p><p>“Make his name one third of the door’s space,” Castle said, pointing it out. “That way we have ample room for them all.”</p><p>“Okay.” She shook her head and just went for it, printing James’s name in big block letters, a capital J, the a-m-e-s all in smaller capitals beside it.</p><p>“Nice job. Here’s the red. Write Wyatt.”</p><p>“You should write Wyatt,” she said, capping the blue as she straightened up. Were her hands shaking? Shit. She was putting entirely too much into this.</p><p>“Why me? I’m marking their lines and putting their ages and the date. Oh. Unless you wanted to do Wyatt.” His face fell, though she could see he was struggling to stay neutral.</p><p>He really wanted to do this. It meant something to Castle.</p><p>Of course it did. Castle was a good father.</p><p>She shook her head and took the red marker from him. “I can do it. The boys and Wolf.” She leaned in and measured her space, wrote Wyatt’s name in the same style as his brother’s, no hesitations.</p><p>“Looks good. Doesn’t it look good? Their names on the door.” Castle’s voice sounded thick. She turned to look at him, and he wouldn’t meet her eyes for a moment, rubbing a hand over his face.</p><p>“Rick?”</p><p>“Sorry. Just.” He shook his head and took the marker. Cleared his throat. “I’m alright. I’m - fuck. Sorry.”</p><p>“Don’t be sorry,” she said quietly, sinking back on her heels. James plopped down in her lap like nothing at all was the matter.</p><p>“I’m fine,” Castle repeated. “Just can’t help thinking about how your parents did this with you, and now you and I are doing it with - these boys. And.” He cleared his throat again, let out a breath. “There’s history there. I don’t - I’ve never known history like that. Family traditions. I feel punched in the gut.”</p><p>She laughed. She didn’t mean to, but it was just so evident on his face that he was really feeling it, and that punched in the gut feeling described pretty much every event with these two boys.</p><p>How had this happened?</p><p>“I get it,” she said. “It still knocks me on my ass when I think about it too hard.”</p><p>Castle gave her a weak smile. “Alright, enough being sappy, I know. Wyatt?” He got to his feet and headed around the bar, looking for the boy. “There you are. What are you doing to Wolf?”</p><p>“Hi, Daddy.”</p><p>Kate smiled into the top of James’s head to hear Wyatt’s oh-so-innocent voice. </p><p>“Fuck. You guys are scary,” Castle said. And then dog and boy were being led back into the kitchen; she could hear Wolf’s nails on the floor.</p><p>When she turned her head to look, Castle had Wyatt by the hand - and Wyatt had Wolf by the leash.</p><p>“What?” she gasped. “Who put the collar on Wolf?”</p><p>“Me!” Wyatt squealed. “Me, Mommy!”</p><p>“Me,” James insisted in return. “My Uff!”</p><p>“Holy shit.” Her eyes jerked up to Castle’s and he just shook his head. “Will it hurt the stitches?”</p><p>“The collar rests just above the start of his wound. If he tries to scratch at it with his hind legs though-” Castle shrugged. “We’ll just have to pay attention. Now that it’s on him, I don’t want to take it off.”</p><p>“Wow. James. Wyatt. Good job, guys. But maybe let’s not play near Wolf’s sharp teeth again, huh?”</p><p>Wyatt just cheered.</p><p>-----</p><p>“They’re dead even,” Castle remarked. “They’re not identical twins, you can tell just by looking at them, but their heights are dead even.”</p><p>Kate hid a smirk in her shoulder as she picked up James from the kitchen table. Castle couldn’t stop talking about the boys’ growth charts, and how he wanted to mark them every month until they hit two (holy shit they would be two), and the pride leaking out of his voice with every word was really kind of cute.</p><p>He was cute.</p><p>She never thought she’d exactly think of Rick Castle, badass spy, as cute. He was intimidating; he was steady; he was bullying; he was kind. But all of those qualities wrapped into the man and made him formidable, a little untouchable. </p><p>Not cute.</p><p>And yet, here was cute.</p><p>He had no idea he was being a little much, no clue that his eagerness was all out of bounds to the actuality of marking off height on a wall. </p><p>But yeah, it was really adorable and she wanted to kiss his face all over.</p><p>Sit in his lap and press her body against his and kiss that mouth for all the stupid, eager, happy words it spilled out.</p><p>“What?” he said. He was walking Wyatt to the living room with a diaper under his arm. “Why are you looking at me like that?”</p><p>“Just wishing it was bedtime already,” she said easily.</p><p>His face changed, all that sweetness smashed off with the stone of his rampant lust.</p><p>Now there was the side of him she was most familiar with. There was the man who allowed no quarter. </p><p>Shit, she was seriously turned on right now. Lips and lips were tingling.</p><p>“Mommy?”</p><p>She cleared her throat and glanced down at James in her arms, trying to get it together. “Yes, baby. What do you need?”</p><p>“Wuff?”</p><p>“Oh, putting a ‘w’ on it already? Wolf. Well, he’s on the couch-”</p><p>At his name, the dog barked, short and happy, and came bounding around the couch, jumped clean over Wyatt and Castle hunched over him on the floor. Castle shot her a look, incredulity, but Wolf was already lunging for her, his paws coming down on her hips - and James’s leg.</p><p>James startled in her arms, but he was laughing in the next second, leaning out for the wolf like nothing had happened.</p><p>But his leg was bleeding.</p><p>“Castle,” she gasped.</p><p>“What’s wrong?”</p><p>“Shit,” she breathed, gripping Wolf by the collar and shoving him down. “Down, down. Lie down.”</p><p>Wolf whimpered and went to his belly, but Kate barely looked at him, swinging James over to the bar and sitting him on the counter.</p><p>Castle had already come around the kitchen table, leaving Wyatt on the floor half-undressed. “It’s okay, Kate. It’s okay. It’s not that deep.”</p><p>“I didn’t even think-”</p><p>“His paws, that’s all. We’ll work on it, file them down or something. James, my man, you’re fine, aren’t you?” He touched the boy’s chin, tilting his head up, and Kate realized James was sad-faced, leaning for her, whining.</p><p>She’d done that too. She’d scared him by her reaction and he hadn’t been scared at all. His leg was dripping blood to the tile-</p><p>“Look, Kate, honey. Look. He’s already healing.” Castle swiped two fingers across James’s little calf and smeared the blood away.</p><p>And now there were two faint lines at the top with little gaps of skin at their end points. Now it looked like a welted scratch, not three claw marks in his flesh.</p><p>“Oh, my God,” she whispered.</p><p>Castle caught her hip before she could stumble back, James’s blood smearing her elbow. She stared at his leg and reached out for it herself, her thumb hesitantly touching the healing lines near his knee.</p><p>“Mommy?” James whimpered.</p><p>Wolf was whimpering too, from the floor, but when she gave him a glance, she saw Wyatt had crawled over - only in his diaper - and laid his body over the dog’s, patting his flank with his cheek on Wolf’s spine.</p><p>Castle chuckled, evidently seeing the same thing. “Yeah, I don’t think we’re going to be able to keep them away from each other, Kate. At least they heal up fast. And, hey, look, honey, he’s more upset that you’re upset than he feels the scratch.”</p><p>“It wasn’t a scratch,” she whispered.</p><p>“Well, it is now,” Castle said soberly. “I - need to know you’re okay with this, Kate. Because this is - this is life for us. For me, for these boys. Even Colin. It doesn’t look like everyone else’s-”</p><p>“How can I be okay?” she croaked. “I’m not okay. I don’t know that I can ever be okay-”</p><p>“But - but you’re their mother. You’re-”</p><p>“Not that,” she groaned, rubbing her hands down her face. She turned then and grabbed James, pulled him up into her chest, cuddling him, breathing him in. “It’s their normal, I get it, your normal. But me - I’m messed up, I am so fucked up, Castle. All I see is how I - how I’ve damaged them. How I’m going to damage them. This wolf I can’t let go of, this shit in my head, the ways I can’t control myself-”</p><p>“Shut up, Kate. Shut the hell up.” He grabbed her, crushed her into his chest, James caught between them. “You are not damaging them. If anything, you are the only right thing in their lives. The only consistent good they’ve ever had. Don’t say that.”</p><p>She grit her teeth and pressed her forehead hard into his neck, wishing she could just wring out all of the fucking messed up shit inside her. She knew, on some level, that the things she said weren’t her. That this version of herself wasn’t the one she ought to be, or had ever meant to be, or been meant to be - however the hell destiny or fate or choices worked.</p><p>But this was who she’d turned out to be. And that other version of Kate Beckett was dead dead dead.</p><p>Never to be resurrected.</p><p>She didn’t know how to be good for them. Only how to hurt.</p><p>-----</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Chapter 3</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It wasn’t that she didn’t know how to be okay.</p><p>She’d had normal. For nineteen years, she’d had exactly the average native New Yorker’s life. She’d had both parents, not divorced, one little apartment, a motorcycle she’d bought in a season of both rebellion and work ethic, and a fun if a little crazy high school career.</p><p>She’d had a semester of college, and then-</p><p>Well, all this. Fubar. That’s what Colin had called that last one. Fucked up beyond all recognition. That became her life.</p><p>But it wasn’t like she didn’t know how to be okay.</p><p>She just couldn’t seem to stay there. What was her problem? She couldn’t seem to forget, to scrape it out of her brain and just live the life she had now: two good boys, a man who wanted to be their father and partner with her in this, a beautiful place where she was safe.</p><p>Support. She had people. Not just Castle, but even Colin thought she could make something out of the pieces. Mark and Carrie Eastman would love to jump in. </p><p>“Come on, baby,” Castle murmured, taking her hand and drawing her away from the bar.</p><p>She had just come to a stop here, watched while Castle supervised the boys with Wolf. Watched like she wasn’t allowed in on that.</p><p>But here was Castle drawing her back into orbit. </p><p>“Kate, come on. We’re supposed to keep the dog calm so he can settle for the night. Learn our routines. I bet we’re supposed to be doing that for the babies too, right?”</p><p>She let out a breath, realized she was a little amused despite herself. “Yeah, that’s probably a smart idea. Settle in for the night. All of us.”</p><p>James and Wyatt were playing on the floor with the car garage while Wolf circled the room, big loops as he sniffed at everything, trying to make himself comfortable.</p><p>Poor wild thing. Hell, that was her, wasn’t it? She was the damn wolf.</p><p>Castle cupped her elbows and drew her back with him towards the living room. “Okay, that’s better, right?” He smiled tentatively at her. “I kinda feel like we’re on the edge of something, and maybe we should talk about it? Do therapy if we can?”</p><p>She swallowed and let him tug her towards the couch. “Talk? I remember someone saying shut up.”</p><p>Castle huffed, sitting down and now dragging her with him. She stumbled over his feet but he was pulling her all the way down, across his thighs. Castle’s fingers skimmed at her sides and she thought to defend herself against tickling, but instead he plunged his hand beneath her pants.</p><p>“Whoa, shit,” she gasped, hips riding up.</p><p>Castle grinned down into her face, eyebrow lifting, looking so proud of himself. He teased along her panties and sneaked a finger lower, into the mesh of her curls.</p><p>She clutched his forearm. “How’s - how’s this talking? You keep touching me and I won’t be saying a word.”</p><p>His fingers stopped.</p><p>She groaned.</p><p>“Shhh,” Castle whispered. “Keep it down, sweetheart. Wolf is getting curious.”</p><p>“Oh, God, that’s not funny.”</p><p>“I’m not exactly kidding.”</p><p>She laughed, only to have his fingers push into her sex and stroke. She pressed her thighs together, and her lips, trying to hold it back, keep it from spilling out of her. But Castle gripped the back of her neck and hunched in over her, thrusting his tongue inside her mouth even as he touched her.</p><p>She moaned into his kiss, feeling it travel all through her body and down between her legs, setting up a fire.</p><p>And then Castle released her, withdrawing slowly, his mouth hovering above hers and his fingers sliding up and circling her navel.</p><p>“Rick.” She was still gripping his forearm as if for dear life. </p><p>“Hey, beautiful.”</p><p>She shivered, shuttering herself away on some level she couldn’t control, as if his honest compliments, his appraisal, made her run. It made her run. What the hell was wrong with her?</p><p>His thumb dusted her hip, and she realized he was shifting to lie on the couch with her, his body now pressed to hers, his hand cradling the back of her head. </p><p>“Kate,” he murmured.</p><p>“Is Wolf okay?”</p><p>“Wolf is still circling. Kate. Are you okay?”</p><p>“I’m...”</p><p>He kissed the tip of her nose and she closed her eyes, her breath shaky. </p><p>His lips ghosted her eyelid.</p><p>“I’m scared to death of myself,” she whispered.</p><p>“How can I help?”</p><p>“I - don’t know how to stop.”</p><p>“I’m not afraid of you,” he murmured. Her eyes came open and he smiled. “Not at all afraid of you. How could I be? You’re amazing. Lying on this couch with me asking about a wolf you rescued. Wanting to be good enough for our sons.”</p><p>“I don’t know if I can be good-”</p><p>His fingers stroked. She gasped and rose up into his touch, stunned to find his hand between her legs. Her lashes fluttered and she felt the warmth of his mouth at her neck.</p><p>“You can be, you are,” he whispered. </p><p>The sound of him traveled down through her bones. Between her legs. She was restless and hot and she really wanted more.</p><p>“More?” he murmured. “Talk to me, sweetheart.”</p><p>“I - what do you want me to say?”</p><p>“How do you feel right now?”</p><p>“On fire.”</p><p>He chuckled and she moaned, hips rocking into his fingers, wanting harder, movement, something. Castle licked her neck and nipped at that skin. “On fire is good. But how do you feel, Kate? How do you feel-”</p><p>“I can do this,” she husked, arching into his hand. “This I can do. I can always do this. Oh, please, Rick-”</p><p>He began thrusting his fingers inside her, and she let out a breathy sound, trying not to be too loud, trying not to draw the boys’ attention, no one’s, the dog, nothing but Castle, Castle-</p><p>“That’s it, baby. Come for me. Right here on the couch, your cheeks flushed and your beautiful body moving for me. Open your eyes and let it go-”</p><p>She groaned into a climax that washed over her like a breaking wave. Dragged out everything else, washed her clean, scrubbed so clean and wet and sparkling.</p><p>His lips touched her lips.</p><p>“So beautiful. So, so beautiful, Kate Beckett.”</p><p>-----</p><p>For a long time, she just laid on the couch with Castle raised up on his elbow and keeping her close. She wasn't sure she could do anything other than that, her limbs liquified and her head swimming in all those pleasant feelings. She drifted in it, warm, fuzzy, not quite able to come back.</p><p>James abandoned his cars under the coffee table and came to their feet, clinging to the cushion as he tried to climb up. Castle smoothed the waistband of her leggings and pulled her shirt down, and then he lifted up to help James clamber onto them.</p><p>"You mind?" he murmured, bringing the boy between them.</p><p>"Mm, we can share. Is Wolf okay?" She looped a weighted arm around James and dusted kisses to his cheeks as he squirmed. </p><p>"He's sniffing the furniture. I think he's stopped circling."</p><p>"Wy?"</p><p>"Uh, I think cause he's finally settling-"</p><p>She giggled and James giggled with her. "No, sorry. I was asking about Wyatt. Is Wy okay-"</p><p>"Yeah, he's still under the coffee table." Castle was propped up on one elbow over her, and he reached past James's head to stroke her hair. </p><p>That felt good. Her eyes were growing heavy. James squirmed and laid his cheek against her chest, and she rested her hand on his back and breathed against his weight. Castle's fingers tangled at the top of her head, slowly began working out the knots. She opened her eyes and looked up at him, saw he was watching Wyatt and the Wolf instead of her.</p><p>Her heart eased, reasons she couldn't grasp. But she switched hands on James to lift her fingers to Castle's chin, scratching softly at the dent in his strong chin. He had stubble there like he hadn't been precise shaving, like he'd been hurrying this morning and-</p><p>Oh, yes. She smiled and pressed her thumb to that perfect cleft, pleased to have been the cause of this one oasis of stubble. The look on his face when he had clicked off the electric shaver and tossed it carelessly into the sink and grabbed her - it made her liquid in places that had just begun to firm again.</p><p>James wriggled on top of her and tucked a hand down her shirt, gripping the strap of her bra. She kissed his crown and laid her head back to the couch cushion, closing her eyes again. James used to do this when he was a newborn, curl up so tightly on her chest and then hang onto her, whatever piece of her he could get. Usually that sweatshirt, the one she'd eventually ripped into pieces for them. He'd get a grip of the hood or a foot caught in the pocket or his whole face under the loose collar, trying to get closer.</p><p>Sweet boy. Maybe five minutes to hold him like that, one minute. Soothing him after breastfeeding, patting his back to be sure he was settled. And then gone. No time left. </p><p>She always went back to the room with the ghost of him in her arms, against her skin. Since he'd always been fed last, it was James she carried with her in her senses, James who lingered. She could remember even now the feel of his skull in the curve of her palm, how small.</p><p>His mouth opened at her collarbones, his body relaxing. </p><p>Castle's fingers had settled in her hair at the top of her head, the heel of his hand resting on her forehead. He had one knee pulled up to lay over her thigh and his chest was pressed all against her arm.</p><p>She realized her hand was still raised to touch his chin, and she opened her eyes again, smoothed his jaw back to his ear. He nuzzled down into her touch and his eyes flickered down to meet hers.</p><p>He smiled. "Look at them now." His head nudged her hand, chin jerking towards the coffee table.</p><p>With James sprawled on her chest, she summoned the energy to turn her head and look, caught sight of Wolf down on his belly with his rear end up in the air, tail wagging, paws extended, trying to wriggle in under the coffee table with Wyatt.</p><p>She grinned and turned back to Castle. He was grinning too, looking pretty pleased with everything. He kissed the meat of her palm and caught her hand with his, held their clasp against his chest. "Wolf likes the boys," he murmured. "I think that was our biggest hurdle. So long as they don't antagonize the thing too badly, it's going to work."</p><p>"It's going to work," she murmured. Her fingers tightened in his, and he leaned in and kissed her mouth. Soft at first, so that her heart thumped with that stirring of overwhelmed too much this is too much, but the second the thought popped into her head and closed up her lungs, he was trailing his mouth down her jaw and tonguing her neck.</p><p>And all that easy lassitude came back again, settling as heavy as the boy on her chest, settling like a weight, like the force of Castle's whole being had come to bear on her, to anchor her, and she was fine and good and right.</p><p>He sucked a mark on her neck, harder, harder, until she cried out.</p><p>Castle groaned into the space between her neck and shoulder. "Is it not fucking bedtime already?"</p><p>"Nowhere close."</p><p>Damn it all.</p><p>-----</p><p>What Castle really wanted was fifteen minutes uninterrupted with her alone. Fifteen. He could totally do it in fifteen minutes and make her come twice doing it.</p><p>But James was actually looking straight at him from his resting place on Kate's torso, while the Wolf prowled under the coffee table with Wyatt, those two heads probably a lot closer together than was wise. Especially after Kate's minor flip-out when James's leg had been scratched.</p><p>Okay, clawed a little. Wolf's puppy toenails were rough and and sharp and any other kid would've needed butterfly bandages, would've been howling, really, at the top of their lungs, but not his son. Not James.</p><p>Castle paused, his hand arrested in the process of rucking up her shirt to get at the skin just below James's drawn up knee.</p><p>Any other kid would have been sobbing real tears.</p><p>Not James.</p><p>A slow, sick wave came over him.</p><p>His father had been doing more tweaking, hadn't he?</p><p>They would need to get the boys in to see a neuro doc. They might have to - that kind of imperviousness to pain could lead to leprosy, the skin rotting because they just didn't feel the harm they were doing to themselves. It would be such a fucking complex problem, and-</p><p>Shit.</p><p>It might not be his father experimenting with their genetics. It might have been his father experimenting with James's willpower.</p><p>As Black had done to Castle before him.</p><p>Tell yourself the pain doesn't exist. It's only synapses relaying information. That information is for the weak, for those who need to stop. Do you need to stop, Richard, or are you a man?</p><p>Fuck.</p><p>Fuck.</p><p>"Rick?"</p><p>He jerked his eyes up to hers and forced the thought out of his head. Blanked his mind because she was already scarily accurate at reading even his blank affect. "Hey."</p><p>"What's wrong?"</p><p>"Just thinking too hard," he assured her, his smile tight. Parts of the truth. Never the whole. He could not let her know his suspicions. He'd look through the boys' records to see what their trials had been. </p><p>"About what?" she whispered. Her thumb trailed at his chin, her fingers cupping his jaw. Caressing and exploring him, as if feeling him out for the truth.</p><p>"What - their life must have been like," he said roughly. "Yours. Just - this kid lying right here on top of you just because he can. Fuck. How clear it is that he didn't get to have you in that fucking place and I'm-"</p><p>Kate pressed her thumb into his lips and he shut his mouth, avoiding her eyes. But that was worse, and he buried his head into her neck and shoulder, breathing hard. Because that was true too - he was thinking more and more about how fucking little they’d had, how little she'd been allowed, been given, not only of the boys but of just human kindness and out of everyone in the whole damn world to deserve better, it was Kate Beckett.</p><p>She didn't say it's okay, she didn't say anything. She just trailed her fingers through his hair at the back of his skull and stayed, her body for his comfort, and what a fucking asshole he was.</p><p>Little fingers against his ear. "Daddy." Prodding until Castle turned his head and came nose to nose with James.</p><p>"Yeah," he said roughly. "I get the appeal, kid, I really do."</p><p>Kate chuckled, a hand at his head, a hand at James's, and stroking both of them. Felt strange, this sudden connection that arose between them, like he was both himself and James as well, the similar experience of her fingers running through hair, but his hair or the boy's?</p><p>"Okay, okay," she whispered. "That's a little intense, guys."</p><p>"I'm not doing it," he murmured, watching James. "I don't think I am."</p><p>"Shit," she breathed, but he heard the awe in it just as he felt it climbing up his guts and bursting in his chest. And it might not even be his own awe, it might be hers, or the boy's, it might be some shared combination that free-floated.</p><p>"Wow." Her fingers went still in their hair and slowly, slowly, the feeling faded to merely impression. Sense memory. Phantom limbs.</p><p>"Wow is right." Kate touched James's forehead and lifted her head to place a kiss at her fingertips. James's eyes were closing, heavy-lidded, and it was only six o'clock.</p><p>"Hey, baby bear," he murmured, sliding a hand to the boy's back and rubbing slow circles. "Does that wear you out? We're gonna have to teach you how to use that, you know. It's sweet of you, kid, but you're not responsible for making me - or mommy - feel better."</p><p>Kate sucked in a breath. "Is that what he was doing?"</p><p>"I think so. Something like that. In a really primitive way, Kate. The simple way a baby wants his mother - that's what he was giving us. Comfort. But now he's falling asleep and he just woke from a long afternoon nap."</p><p>"Do you think he was doing it earlier today?" she murmured, both hands now cradling James. "And does it help if he - has us here? I mean, that was really strong. I've never felt - well, maybe, maybe a few times like that. But..."</p><p>"I don't know. I have no idea. Colin doesn't do this. Colin can't share things with me, he can only be overwhelmed. And I don't think our kids are being overwhelmed, do you?"</p><p>Kate's lips gave a strange twist, and then she laughed - or maybe it was a cry - and she snaked an arm around his neck and jerked him down against her, their cheeks colliding.</p><p>"Shit, you okay?"</p><p>She laughed and kissed his face, all over, and then bit down on his chin and tugged at the scruff growing in. "I'm - okay. I'm okay. You said - I just - have help with this. I don't - I worried alone, all alone, and now you worry with me, and even if I can see them, I can hold them, there are still things to worry, still things I can't control with all the things I can control, and how - weird is that?"</p><p>"It's not weird at all," he whispered, his cheek still held down hard against her own. She released him and cleared her throat, shaking her head. He kissed her quietly, trying not to pour his own vulnerability into it, trying to keep it firm enough for support. "It's not weird to worry about them. Of course we do. We love them."</p><p>"We do," she whispered, her smile stretching across her face. She was stroking two fingers down James's neck, and the boy was sacked out completely. She looked pretty blissed herself, but she opened her eyes to him.</p><p>And shared it.</p><p>And James wasn't any kind of conduit for this. It was just them, together, existing in the same moment.</p><p>He would take a look at the boys' records the second he got a chance alone. He wasn't sure how in the hell he was going to tell her about Black's peculiar methods for teaching pain tolerance.</p><p>Hopefully he wouldn't have to.</p><p>-----</p><p>"He's really asleep," she muttered, wincing as she shifted James off her chest.</p><p>Castle gathered the boy close, not being overly gentle, but she was right. James was dead to the world. "He really is." He finally managed to stand, nudging Wolf out of his way rather instinctively, and it made the dog dip down and roll onto his back, belly up, in submissive position.</p><p>Shit, now he had to follow through.</p><p>"Hang on, dog," he sighed, dropping to one knee with James held out in front of him like a baby. Wolf whined and wriggled when Castle scratched his belly, and his back legs moved rhythmically against Castle's thigh as he rubbed down the dog's neck. He avoided the wound, and Wolf didn't seem too concerned with the spot.</p><p>Kate was on her feet now, stretching overhead, and Wolf mimicked her, paws reaching up and tongue lolling out. He chuckled at the sight, James cradled in the crook of his elbow, his bottom supported only by Castle's thigh as he crouched on the floor. </p><p>The kid was really, heavily asleep.</p><p>Much as he hated to say it - "Maybe James should sleep with us?" he asked. "I can keep an eye on him that way."</p><p>She sank down to sit at the edge of the coffee table, her feet tucking under as she messed with Wyatt. "You think - he might stop breathing?"</p><p>"Do you think so?"</p><p>She chewed on her bottom lip. "Do you think he knew about this? You said it was just between you and Colin, but obviously Ben and Alex knew."</p><p>Castle sighed, patting Wolf before he rose again. "I really don't think Black knew. If he had, he'd have used it. And he never did, not once. He thought Colin was a fuck-up and that was that. He'd washed his hands of Colin long ago, the black sheep. Rotten apple, actually, was the phrase he used with me. So no."</p><p>"So he wouldn't have known about the boys. He wouldn't have been - testing that with them. How could he have known unless they - well, it had to be fairly extreme, what they did to get me back." Her face crumpled a little, but she struggled to close it off. He could see her fighting it. The whole idea of it. Of what the boys had done.</p><p>"You know, if the boys... so say together they're pretty damn strong, right? I mean, we've experienced that a little, and just now with James and us. But at dinner when I scared them - remember? That was a pretty intense feeling that cropped up, and it let us both know they were scared, and it was also clear that they were used to dampening their own feelings - or heightening others. So..."</p><p>She took up the thread as he faltered. "So they might have made Black think it was worse than it was?"</p><p>"They might have impressed upon him just how avidly they wanted you back. Don't you think? I cannot fathom any reason other than death that he would have let you have that kind of power over him."</p><p>"Over him?" she whispered, cutting her eyes to his.</p><p>"We know that he needed you to - for the genetics. But he didn't have to keep you conscious for that. He needed you conscious because he needed these boys to be as normal and healthy as possible. I mean, look at them, Kate. Yeah, the kid is sacked out in my arms, but the fact that he can trust us both enough to do that?"</p><p>"They're okay," she husked.</p><p>"They're very okay. They learned early, yes, and their super blood, the elixir stuff - that might have sped up cognitive abilities and problem solving skills, that's for sure. Because they solved that problem - and the solution, to have you feed them every night and hold them? - that had to have irritated the fuck out of him."</p><p>"It did." Her jaw worked.</p><p>His heart was like a knot in his chest, in his throat, that he had trouble breathing past. "What they did for you was extreme, but a lot of it might have been emotional manipulation. And see? James doing just a little of it and he's passed right out. Had he been a newborn doing this, don't you think that would've been kind of scary - how dead to the world he is?"</p><p>Her eyes flickered over James. "Kinda scary right now."</p><p>"Yeah," he breathed. He lifted James to his shoulder and the boy flopped like a boneless thing. "Yeah, kinda scary right now. That's for damn sure. What's Wyatt doing?"</p><p>"He's being very quiet," she whispered. "But he's got his fingers on my toes."</p><p>Castle let out a huff, a smile tugging at his lips. "Wyatt? Hey, little frog. Come on out of there. Play with Wolf."</p><p>At his name, Wolf gave a yipping howl, his head thrown back, and he trotted around the coffee table and butted into Kate's knees.</p><p>James didn't wake. But Wyatt did crawl out from under the coffee table. Only to promptly fall on Wolf's back and drag the poor puppy's hind legs to the ground with him. </p><p>Kate snatched at Wyatt and pulled him off, and he saw her gentling her response, making her face and tone soft as she consoled both dog and boy until they were happy again, and unhurt. Wyatt stuck close to Kate, clinging to her jeans pocket as she sat on the coffee table, leaning his body against her thigh.</p><p>"Hey, you think Wyatt helped James out a little?" he said, nodding to the boy.</p><p>Kate rubbed her hand over the top of Wyatt's head, studying him. "I don't know. He's a little more subdued, but he was playing a game under there with the cars. I've seen him like this before... though that's not saying anything at all. What do I know?"</p><p>"You're his mother," he murmured, throat closing up because she was right. Essentially, she was guessing too. She hadn't been allowed them long enough to know. "It's all guesswork, though, Kate. I mean, even Colin doesn't do this. Not like this. We'll work it out."</p><p>She nodded, and he saw her revitalize, the life coming back into her eyes. "For now, I guess we should dump everyone in our bed. Maybe Wolf will want to stay in our room too."</p><p>"I doubt it," he laughed. "And it's only a little after six. He won't settle for a while. He's too nocturnal."</p><p>How little Castle knew.</p><p>Wolf followed him right into the bedroom and jumped up on the bed with James, just that fast.</p><p>Damn. He saw his window of opportunity slipping.</p><p>"Wolf, down. We're going back out into the living room with Wyatt and Mom-" Shit. "Kate. Mommy. Whatever, come on. Get down, rascal."</p><p>He was getting some damn alone time with Kate. That was that.</p><p>Even if they had to do it in the boys' bedroom. </p><p>-----</p>
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<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Chapter 4</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>But when he came into the living room, Kate was rounding up Wyatt and all of the boy’s toys. He didn’t want to give up anything - whining after his mother for the cars, the rubber blocks, the army men (bad idea that; he should not have bought his sons army men, what the fuck?), the stuffed rabbit, the rag doll.</p><p>That was the last. Castle put a stop to it, reaching in and scooping up Wyatt and the rag doll and rabbit both. “Son. You can’t carry all of these things. Mom is trying to help you. She won’t take them away.”</p><p>Castle caught sight of her face and he felt it clutch in his guts. </p><p>Maybe someone had.</p><p>Shit.</p><p>He hooked his arm around her neck and dragged her into him, Wyatt and Kate both, just the three of them with the damn dog back to circling the room, unsettled. “Fuck, baby, you had to take the rag dolls away. I know. Fuck. I’m sorry. That was fucking stupid.”</p><p>“Uck,” Wyatt said, squirming in between them. “Uck, Daddy. Me.”</p><p>“Yeah, here’s your rag doll and your bunny both. But look, buddy, Mom wants us all in the bedroom so we can keep an eye on your brother, so we’re moving everything into there. Yeah? You understand, I know you do. Promise everything is coming with us.” He roughly kissed Wyatt’s forehead and turned to Kate. “Mommy has the rest of it, right Mommy? You okay?”</p><p>“Yeah. I’ve got everything.”</p><p>He felt like shit, but feeling like shit didn’t do fucking shit to help them, did it? He had to shove that down and keep up his relentless determination. Relentless love. Feeling ashamed and sick to his guts wouldn’t change things.</p><p>“Alright, come on, my sad ghosts. Let’s have some fun while James sleeps. Wyatt, have you ever had Mommy and Daddy all to yourself? With a puppy too?”</p><p>Kate let out a choked noise, like a laugh, but he was dragging her along with him, her hands too filled with Wyatt’s toys to stop him.</p><p>Once inside their bedroom, Wolf snaking through the doorway and now bounding into the room ahead of them, Kate wriggled free of him. She lowered all of Wyatt’s toys to the bed and Castle dropped the boy and his rabbit and rag doll right beside them.</p><p>“See, kid? Everything’s here.”</p><p>“My Mommy.”</p><p>Kate leaned in and cupped his cheeks. “Yes, baby. I’m your mommy.” She kissed his forehead, and then his nose, and Wyatt giggled, tilting back crazily.</p><p>So happy to have her. And his toys that usually got taken away.</p><p>“Where did you keep those, Kate?” he said, reaching out to put his arm around her shoulders. She flinched but sank into his side, both of them standing before the bed as Wyatt began arranging his toys in a line. That fine motor coordination in full view. “Kate. Talk to me, sweetheart. Please. I think it helps me understand what we’re working through with the boys, with you.”</p><p>“With me,” she muttered. “My issues seem fairly well insidious, don’t they?”</p><p>“Insidious is such a nasty word,” he murmured, squeezing her shoulders. “Sit with me - and talk? Just in the chairs while Wyatt messes with his brother. Maybe it’ll wake him up.”</p><p>She huffed but moved for the armchairs that were stationed before the stone stairs up to the second floor. She sat rigidly, one fist on her pressed together knees. She didn’t look thrilled for talking, so he figured maybe he should switch it up.</p><p>But she was going to talk - even if he had to trick her into it.</p><p>He sank back into his own seat, one glance across the bed to make sure he could see James breathing, and then he crossed an ankle over his knee. “Col and I usually do a project every winter - you know, on the house - and I had an idea. If you’re okay with it.”</p><p>“If I’m okay - what about Colin?” she startled. Her body was jolted out of its tension with his comment, and her own surprise, and she pulled her feet up into the seat, crossing her legs. “Castle, I don’t want to take over Colin’s rightful place-”</p><p>“I’m asking because it’s your house too, and because I already hashed it out with Colin a bit. Tried to give him a reason to come home soon. Ish.”</p><p>She shivered and rubbed her arms. “Is he okay? Don’t you usually go looking for him, Rick?”</p><p>He checked his watch, noting the date like he hadn’t already and constantly since Colin had disappeared on them. “I have three more days before it’s a problem.”</p><p>“Can we - um - we should go with you. He’s family.”</p><p>His throat closed up, but he nodded, bobbing his head.</p><p>“Three days? Do you think Wolf would ride in the car?” she murmured. </p><p>Shit.</p><p>“Wolf,” she called softly. The dog-beast turned his head, and for an instant, all of that feral wild animal was in him, hackles raised, toenails clicking against the wood floor, teeth bared. But the moment Kate wriggled her fingers at Wolf, he was all bounding puppy, eager for her, coming right up to her knees and squirming to get closer.</p><p>To - fuck - actually get in her lap. He had jumped right up.</p><p>Castle laughed, and Wolf hunched on her thighs, teetered, but Kate put her arms around him and eased him to her lap and the chair - since he was a little too big to fit.</p><p>“Shit, that thing,” he muttered. Kate grinned and petted him down, stroking back over Wolf’s skull and between his ears so that Wolf closed his eyes and panted, grinning like a fool.</p><p>“Yeah, you’ll ride in the car with us, won’t you, Wolf? Sweet boy. Hey, that’s right.” She wrinkled her nose as Wolf licked her face, her lips (gross Kate), her chin and neck. “Such a good boy. You’re really a baby, aren’t you? Little cub.”</p><p>“Wolves aren’t cubs,” he muttered. She kept saying that. Wolves had pups, not cubs. But what the fuck. Why did he care? Let her call the thing a cub; she already knew it was a pup. “You’ll have to hold it in your lap the whole ride.”</p><p>“I can do that,” she grinned. Grinned. Only Castle made her grin like that.</p><p>“Fuck, baby, stop making over the damn dog. I’m being cock-blocked by my own kids. And the dog growls when I make you come. So fuck. You’re gonna have to talk to me. God knows I won’t be hard if you’re telling me about the shit you’ve gone through. Where the fuck did you hide those rag dolls?”</p><p>Kate straightened up, though her arms were still around the wolf. Her lips twisted but he thought she was amused, actually.</p><p>“You’re hard right now?”</p><p>“Yes. You’re fucking adorable. Shit, Kate. I’ve been hard since - fuck - since we met.”</p><p>“Since we - met?” she laughed. “Drenched in blood and wearing a gross sweatshirt and-”</p><p>“Yes.” He glared at her. “Drenched in blood, so fucking dominant and strong and in possession. Fuck, baby, talking about this is just making me ache. Can we - talk through shit instead?”</p><p>“I used my fingernails to pry a wire up from the cot. A spring. I unwound it enough to use it like a pick, and then I shoved the cot up against the wall where the sink was. I scraped the dry wall, at that place where the sink is sealed to the wall, and I peeled the caulking off. I dug out the wall behind it, a little space, and I hid the dolls in there. He never noticed I was missing a sweatshirt.”</p><p>He stared at her, heart flipping. “The cot. A spring on the cot and you peeled off the sealant.”</p><p>“Yeah.”</p><p>“What about all the dry wall powder?”</p><p>“Down the sink. Water was only turned on at night, and after training, so I just had to nudge it down the drain.”</p><p>Fuck, his erection was entirely gone. He had no trouble now. His guts were churning. “A spring. Is that - how you - the wire?”</p><p>She nodded, her lips twisting. Her eyes filled with tears, but she dashed them away with the back of her hand, glanced to the bed where Wyatt was - uh - on his head, bottom in the air, chattering like a monkey.</p><p>Damn weird kid.</p><p>“I got the spring unwound all the way and then I had to just - work it back and forth until it finally snapped. It took forever.”</p><p>“Ah, baby.” His chest was so tight, his body flashing hot. Like he was gonna be sick.</p><p>Like it had felt when the blade had gone into his back.</p><p>“At least - no room for second thoughts. Took so long to get it off that I didn’t have any more time. Small-smaller they were the better,” she whispered. Her fingers pressed below her eyes, hard, and he saw the tears drop down over her knuckles and spot the wolf’s fur.</p><p>Wolf, bless him, lifted his head and licked her fingers, making her mewl a noise in response that might have been laughter or desperation.</p><p>“Good boy,” he breathed.</p><p>She shot him a look, laughed when Wolf licked all down her hand and chased her tears to the crook of her elbow. She pushed her head back into the chair and let out a breath.</p><p>“You made them rag dolls,” he sighed. “You made them something to love. God. I love you.” He shook his head, rubbed his hand down his face. “And, honey, requires nothing at all from you. I just want you to know - every time you tell me something else, I am just - filled up with how incredible you’ve been for them. You didn’t have to love them, Kate. God knows-”</p><p>“Shut up,” she breathed. She closed her eyes, pressing the heels of her hands into them. “I had to. I loved them. All - all of them. Two by two.” Tears streaked out from under her hands. “And the ones I never knew about. Still.”</p><p>“Of course you do,” he whispered, sinking to his knees and sitting at her feet. Wolf licked his face and he realized he was crying too. “Of course you love them. You love your boys.”</p><p>She sucked in a long, juddering breath and dropped her hands. Wolf whined and licked her wrist then turned into him and nudged his cheek as if to get him moving, talking.</p><p>“Do you - want to name them?” he said. His heart was pounding. This might be the worst-</p><p>“Name - name them?” She lifted her head and stared at him. “The ones I killed-”</p><p>“Sacrifice is sacred, Kate. Don’t make it into something it’s not. You sacrificed, you, to save you all, sweetheart. You saved my sons.”</p><p>Her face crumpled. “I don’t deserve to name - name them-”</p><p>He rose to his knees and caught her head in his hands, forcing her chin up to look at him. “You deserve everything. Give them names, as their mother, give them that, honey. Something we can call them, when we tell their older brothers the story.”</p><p>She caught his forearms in her hands but didn’t pull away from him. She just cried in silence, tears slipping down her cheeks.</p><p>Wolf growled at him, but he ignored the dog. Her eyes dropped to Wolf, and she let go of him with one hand to stroke the dog.</p><p>“Kate, honey, please.”</p><p>“I’ll - think of names,” she whispered. “Will you - will you help me?”</p><p>“Of course, sweetheart. I’d be honored.”</p><p>She nodded, biting her lip, and then canted into him, wrapping her arms around his neck and crushing the dog between them.</p><p>-----</p><p>Castle sank to the edge of the chair and watched her a moment, but she seemed composed once more. Wolf was curled in her lap, his nose pressed into the space between the arm of the chair and her thigh, and Castle was certain Wolf was looking up at her adoringly.</p><p>Kate smoothed her fingers at the top of Wolf’s head, over and over, her eyes far away.</p><p>He forced himself to stop watching her and study his son instead. Wyatt was on the bed, his head to the mattress, kicking his feet like a mule. He seemed to be making himself dizzy, because he collapsed on his side and cackled like a crazy person.</p><p>And it made Castle smile too. He couldn’t help but glance at Kate, and he saw her smiling a little too. “My project idea for this winter,” he said into that break in the tension. “Want to know?”</p><p>“Yeah. What were you thinking?”</p><p>“Bathroom on the second floor for the boys. It’s such unused space - we really didn’t know what we wanted, we just thought it was cool. So we’d run the pipes up from our bathroom and give them their own.”</p><p>“Oh.” She turned her head to him. Her eyes were red-rimmed but she was smiling. “That’s a good idea.”</p><p>“Sometimes I have those.” He smiled back and she turned her head away again, but he understood that too. She had been overwhelmed and she felt raw. She needed limited contact until she could get a handle on herself.</p><p>Or he needed to push it now while she was that raw, while it was all so close to her surface. “When we met,” he said, the words wry in his mouth, “you took me back to the boys’ room, and you said - I’ll never forget - you said these are their secret names.”</p><p>She turned her head now and stared at him.</p><p>“What were the names you had to say out loud?”</p><p>For a moment, everything about her was blank. Absolutely dead. And he knew without a doubt that she was back there; she was living it, not the day they’d been born, and she had named them, not that day, because he had seen her relive that day and it held a whole lot of emotion and even desperate joy, but this was something else.</p><p>Some other day.</p><p>“Cain and Abel.”</p><p>Wyatt jerked like he’d been electrocuted, opened his mouth and sobbed. Real, fat tears that poured down his cheeks, his whole body shaking, but Castle was already out of his chair and running for the boy.</p><p>He scooped up Wyatt and shielded him with both arms, tucked his head down against his son’s. “I know, it’s okay, I know who you are, Wyatt.” Kate had shoved Wolf out of her lap in the same instant that Castle must have been racing to the bed, because she had jumped onto the mattress with Wolf following.</p><p>Kate’s body came against Wyatt’s, her arms around Castle’s own, but she didn’t try to remove him. She just held Wyatt with him, her lips dusting his temple and circling his ear, whispering things to him that Castle couldn’t hear.</p><p>Real tears. Not melodramatics. An honest and immediate fear the second those names had come out of Kate’s mouth.</p><p>“You’re not, you’re not,” she was whispering now, kissing Wyatt’s cheeks. “I will never let you go back. You were always Wyatt to me. You were always mine.”</p><p>The fist in his chest squeezed painfully. He had to sink down to the bed because his legs wouldn’t hold him up any longer. Kate came down on her haunches and gathered Wyatt into her arms, against her chest, but Wyatt whimpered.</p><p>“Daddy.”</p><p>His throat choked up, and he reached out for Wyatt, cupped the back of the boy’s head and kissed him. “Hey, Wyatt. It’s okay.” He wouldn’t take the boy out of her arms, no way on earth was that a good idea, but when he moved to embrace Wyatt, draw him against his own chest, Wyatt cried again.</p><p>“Mommy, Mommy, Mommy-”</p><p>“No one is taking you, no one is taking Mommy,” Castle said fiercely. “We’re all here. All of us together.”</p><p>“Wyatt, here’s your rabbit,” Kate whispered, producing the stuffed bunny and making its ears flop. “Can he cheer you up? He doesn’t like to see you sad, Wyatt.”</p><p>Each time someone said his name, the boy drew in a shaky breath and glanced between them, as if deciding to trust. </p><p>Castle pulled up a few more toys, piled them in Kate’s lap, the boy barely separate from either of them. “And here are your cars, Wyatt, and your blocks. Look, little frog, dry your eyes.” He swiped at Wyatt’s cheeks with the back of his hand. “You’re okay. You’re never going back, no matter how many times we say those names. Gonna have to un-condition you guys, huh?”</p><p>“He was Cain,” Kate murmured. “James the other.”</p><p>Wyatt’s lips tugged down hard, but he didn’t sob. The tears were still welling up, but Castle was glad to see that the kid had braced himself for it.</p><p>“Did you name them that?” He vaguely knew they were religious names, but he was certain his father hadn’t come up with those. Black had been disdainful of religion. Opiate of the masses.</p><p>“I did. He - told me too. Like a gift,” she murmured. Shook her head. “A gift.”</p><p>“I think that’s what we name the ones gone. Put those names to rest.”</p><p>She was quiet for so long that he wished he had kept his mouth shut. But then she looked at him, a stranger darkness across her face. “Cain killed Abel because Abel offered a more pleasing sacrifice. And he was jealous. It’s the first recorded murder in the Bible.”</p><p>“Ah, shit.” His heart pounded. “That’s a terr-”</p><p>“It’s exactly right. They’re gone. Put them to rest.” She pressed her cheek against Wyatt’s, closing her eyes with that sharp gesture of love she had always done. </p><p>But this time she straightened up and touched her palms to Wyatt’s face, cradled it as she thumbed away his tears.</p><p>She kissed Wyatt on the mouth, a brief touch, and bowed her forehead to the boy’s. “You will never be that boy again, Wyatt. I promise.”</p><p>She lifted her head and her eyes burned into his, righteous and purposeful.</p><p>“I promise,” he said, swearing the vow before she even had to say a thing. “Cain and Abel are gone. This is what we have, what we are. We-”</p><p>“We’re free,” she said, her voice cracking as she forced the words past her clenched jaw. “I’m free.” Her nostrils flared. “I’m free. I am never going back.”</p><p>She looked like the wolf.</p><p>-----</p><p>Kate was lying on her back on the mattress, her head tucked into the curve of Castle’s bent knee, an arm around the sleeping James. Wyatt was on his other side, playing with his rag doll and bunny across the sheets, looking sleepy but not yet willing to admit defeat.</p><p>Wolf was wandering the house. So far no big crashes or howling - Wolf must be okay.</p><p>“We could have a ceremony,” he offered.</p><p>“No.”</p><p>He stopped offering. He had nudged a few different ways, but she didn’t seem to want to bring life to any of it - to what was dead. It was his fault, giving her the tools to cut herself off from it, isolate here and now from back then. But maybe it would prove to be good for all of them.</p><p>No memorial. Just move on. Maybe that was best.</p><p>"Is that your phone?" she murmured, turning her head up to look at him.</p><p>He touched his cargo pocket, realized it was vibrating. He'd put it on silent for Wolf's sake, but now he fished it out. "A text," he answered. "Thanks." From Colin. He scrolled through the message and let out a breath of relief.</p><p>"Everything okay?" she said. "Is it work? I don't even know-"</p><p>"It's Colin," he sighed. "He texted to say he's okay. In New York City. I don't know why, but he says he's working on something. And - ha - don't piss you off."</p><p>She hid her smile into the rise of his knee, her face turned away from him. She shifted onto her side, her back to Wyatt, curling up around the still-sleeping James. Her fingers played across James's forehead, smoothed the dark hair away from his face. "Don't piss me off. Good idea. Never know when I'll stab-"</p><p>"That's not how he meant it," Castle interrupted, tugging on her ear. "Don't start that." His fingers trailed at the side of her neck, came around her throat. Lightly. But his heart was pounding something fierce. </p><p>"That's exactly how he meant it," she said roughly. Her voice was hoarse, like he was pressing tighter than he was. She rolled onto her back, releasing James to stare up at Castle. Her arm came up and the back of her hand touched his sternum. "You should be afraid of me. What I might do."</p><p>He rubbed this thumb along her throat, now cradling the back of her neck. But his thumb. She swallowed and he felt it. "Not afraid of you. Though the way you touch me, what happens when I'm inside you, maybe I should be."</p><p>Kate lifted up from his lap and turned into him, her hand catching his where it fell with her movement. She brought him back up to her throat and he curled his fingers around her neck, his thumb pressing in under her jaw.</p><p>Her pulse raced. Throbbing in her neck. Her beautiful, sweet neck with her eyes luminous on his, like a dark and inverse moon. Like a black hole. Pulling all of him into her.</p><p>"You like that?" she murmured.</p><p>"I like you."</p><p>"Do want to?"</p><p>"Hurt you? No."</p><p>"Yeah, you do," she whispered. "Press a little and see-"</p><p>He nudged his thumb under her chin and into the hard place where she swallowed. Her eyes were wide. "Does that hurt?"</p><p>"No."</p><p>"Are you afraid?"</p><p>"No."</p><p>"Good." He leaned in and kissed her mouth, found her hot and eager, her tongue sliding along his, aggression, ferocity, submission. Play.</p><p>With her mouth filled with him, he tightened his fingers on her throat and she moaned, high and thready. Her teeth caught his bottom lip and she came down to his own neck, bit roughly under his jaw and then across his adam's apple, working her way down to his collarbones. Her hands pulled wildly at his shirt; he released her neck to yank it over his head.</p><p>She climbed into his lap and rubbed her body against his, her breathing filled with the sounds of her arousal. "You ought to be afraid," she whispered. "But you're not. I'm not. I just want you more. I want - you to hurt me. Sometimes. I'm sorry, I just want-"</p><p>"I won't hurt you more than you want," he growled. Squeezed her hips until they popped. She rode up against him and whimpered, her mouth open at his temple, across his eye. She sank back in his lap and kissed him with anger, with ferocity, with love.</p><p>He felt it, singing through his blood and bursting out of his skin. She couldn't help it, she didn't want to but she did, she was furious with herself for it, she was furious with him, she was urgent for him.</p><p>She couldn't possibly know she was shoving all of her being into him, couldn't possibly want him to feel all of this that burned and roiled inside her. But their fingers, their mouths, their skins touched and it was inside him.</p><p>"I want to hurt for you," she moaned. "I want to hurt for me, because I want it, because it's mine."</p><p>"No one will hurt you ever again," he growled. His chest was splitting open, bones cracking. "No one but me. When you ask me to, if you ask me - I will do anything. Give you anything. Love you until it hurts. God, it hurts. No one should ever have touched you-"</p><p>"I hate them. I hate him. I wanted him to die. I don't want to keep thinking about him, letting him live inside me. I want you inside me, Castle. Rick, please. Inside me-"</p><p>His fingers were already at her leggings, her spread wide thighs straddling his lap, her body so hot everywhere he touched. He found her and she stiffened, her cry muffled in clenched teeth, and he scraped his fingernail over her clit and pinched.</p><p>She growled, hips thrusting into his hand and body vibrating against his. Her orgasm burst. Stuttered. Fell over her so that she collapsed in his lap, draped over his arm.</p><p>He peeled her leggings down, worked her knee up to get them off, one at a time until she roused enough to help him. She twisted in his lap and kicked off her leggings, the underwear right after it and then she mounted-</p><p>"Oh, shit, Wyatt," she choked out. Her eyes were wide. </p><p>"Wy-" He groaned and buried his face in her breasts, her shirt still clothing her. His arms wrapped around her body tightly and squeezed, desperation making him violent. "Fuck. Kid's not asleep?"</p><p>"No-o-o," she drew out. He felt her reach past him, the strain of her muscles against his body, hard and taut. "Hey, honey. Why don't you go get it? Drop down and get your bunny."</p><p>"Is bunny on the floor?" he croaked out, eyes hidden in her sternum. She was spread thighs over his lap, her sex radiating heat, his cock aching in his pants.</p><p>"On the floor," she breathed. "That's it, Wyatt. Just slide down - good boy. Get the bunny." He felt her move and sensed toys dropping; she was throwing them off the bed, what she could reach, giving Wyatt a little expedition. "Okay, Castle. Go. Go."</p><p>She was already sinking down into his lap, her face beautiful and warrior, her hands reaching for his groin. She had his button thumbed and his zipper undone even as he was stunned by the cream of her thighs in his hands.</p><p>He kissed her and she moaned into his mouth, guiding his cock out of his pants. He was so hard. He was throbbing for her. She teased herself with him and he whimpered.</p><p>"Does it hurt you?" she whispered.</p><p>"It aches."</p><p>"So good?"</p><p>"So fucking good, Kate. Baby. You rip me to shreds."</p><p>"Good," she husked. Her hips danced in the frame of his hands, his cock nudging and sliding through her. She was humming now, and he was in excruciating agony of wanting her, and she seemed to think they had all the time in the world.</p><p>"Let me inside you," he groaned.</p><p>"Don't you want to hurt?"</p><p>"Yes," he hissed, his head bowing forward and collapsing at her shoulder. She lifted and lowered her body in his lap, teasing his cock with her fingers, with her sex. Her lips sucked at his cheek, her teeth scraped. He was digging his fingers into her ass and bruising her as he tried to keep from coming.</p><p>"Enough," she rasped. "I want you. That's enough. Come inside me, Castle."</p><p>He grabbed her by the hip, himself by the cock, and he jerked her down onto him. He was sheathed immediately, intently, and she cried out, head tossed back, breasts shining. He bit her nipple and thrust, and she came spectacularly in his arms, writhing and clenching her teeth against her noises.</p><p>He went up on his knees to fuck her, up and rising up, and she rode him with her legs clamped around his waist. She lowered her body to his in rhythm, and then she mewled his name and sank her teeth into his shoulder.</p><p>He erupted inside her, an orgasm so violent his vision went white.</p><p>He was holding her so hard, he could feel her bones popping.</p><p>-----</p><p>She was breathing hard, a complete hot mess in his arms. He'd stained her shirt with the wet of his mouth and teeth and she was ineffectually trying to tug it back up onto her shoulder without letting go of him.</p><p>"Did we wake James?" she whispered, a kind of giggle in her mouth that made the words bounce in his head. "Is he still breathing?"</p><p>"Oh, fuck," he moaned, burying his face back into her neck.</p><p>She laughed and craned her head to look, and then her whole body tightened up as she leaned out and held on to him. She came back and tightened her arm at his back. "Asleep. And Wyatt disappeared into the bathroom, probably throwing his toys in the toilet. He's fascinated."</p><p>Castle laughed at that. "Oh, good. Cause my cock is hanging out here and we're both too messy for little eyes."</p><p>She squeezed her thighs at his hips as if to reaffirm just how messy she was, and then she reached down between them and stroked the base of his cock. Her lips touched his neck in just the same way, soft, gentle, and he shivered.</p><p>"Is it too fucked up?" she whispered. "What I - wanted you to do."</p><p>"Did I even do it?" he mumbled. "Baby, we haven't even begun to explore the things I can do to you."</p><p>This time, she shivered, pressing her body against his, arms clinging to him. "Oh, yes. All - those things. Anything, you said anything-"</p><p>"Anything," he promised. "We can try anything you like, and if it doesn't feel right, we don't have to do it. But if it does-"</p><p>"I know you don't want to hurt me," she whispered, her cheek pressing in against his, speaking as if to the space between them rather than looking at him. "I know it's messed up, that I'm messed up, but I never knew it could - feel like this."</p><p>"It's not messed up, sweetheart." He cupped her face in his hands and drew her gaze up to look at him. "Honey, you have no idea just how many people do worse than this to each other. The terms of love, sweetheart, different for everyone."</p><p>Her eyes dropped, roamed, came back up to meet his again. "Does it - bother you that I don't have the - the experience to know-"</p><p>"Don't even begin to think that," he gruffed. "I'm so damn honored-"</p><p>"Oh, God, don't be honored. That's revolting-"</p><p>He laughed and kissed her. "I'm thrilled. It makes me hot to think about all the things I get to teach you. Places I get to touch that've never had that kind of touch before. I want to show you - everything, Kate."</p><p>"That's better," she muttered, squirming in his lap. Her fingers were still faintly touching him, like petting, like she was mostly soothing herself with it. She bit her lip and glanced at him. "Does it - bother you what I said about - about your father?"</p><p>"It all fucking bothers me," he growled, gripping her jaw with his thumb, his fingers digging into her skull. "Of all the fucking-"</p><p>She gave a shimmer of a flinch, like residue, and shrank back. "I mean - I wanted to kill him. I wanted him dead and I - I did that. I killed your father."</p><p>"Oh, that," he muttered. "Does it bother you that I've wanted to murder him my whole fucking life and never got the fucking balls to do it? Or to even fucking stand up for myself? Or my brothers? All of these people I supposedly love, and I never said a damn word. I turned my back on them and-"</p><p>She cut off his vitriol with her mouth, her tongue thrusting hard inside, her knees clamped at his waist and squeezing in time. He clutched at her back, crushing her against him, seeking absolution for things he still had no idea how to reconcile. </p><p>And neither did she. He knew that. It was just fucking life.</p><p>She broke off on a gasp, rolled her cheek against his and finally straightened up. "Can I have you again? Just like this, in your lap."</p><p>"You gonna torture me again?"</p><p>"A little. If you want."</p><p>"I want," he husked.</p><p>She fingered his balls and he groaned, losing his breath at the feel of her hand on him. "How's that?"</p><p>"Can't you - feel it?" he grunted. "I'm fucking hard for you already."</p><p>She squirmed down on him, a little harder, his cock going a little deeper, tighter. She gasped and her inside muscles fluttered, little contractions like mouths touching him all over.</p><p>"Oh, God," he whispered.</p><p>"I'm - coming," she panted, her body arching now and gripping him fiercely. And then she bowed forward and groaned, rutting him deep into her with the anxious, fierce work of her hips.</p><p>He just held on, let her do whatever she wanted to do to him, watching her body ripple and flex and lean and contract. He pushed his hands up under her shirt and skimmed through the sweat budding on her skin, came around to cup her breasts. She cried out, the sound muffled by the dark space between them, and then she lifted her head and pinned her dark wild eyes on him.</p><p>"Come for me, Castle." She rode him a little harder, the growl ripping through her throat, her muscles clenching around him. "Come inside me. One more time. One-"</p><p>He gripped her neck, her eyes widened, and he fucked her until his orgasm burst through them both.</p><p>-----</p>
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<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Chapter 5</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Her lips caressed his. Her hands cupping his face were feather soft and yet undeniable. He was washed out in the best way, but he had the idea that he should be talking, telling her things, that she needed more reassurances than she’d ever let on.</p><p>The ones she’d asked after - those had just been the most pressing, the worst of her fears, the ones that couldn’t be silenced.</p><p>He cupped her shoulder blades and pressed her body to his, bent his head out of her grasp to kiss her neck. The place where he’d pushed his thumb into her. “Baby,” he hummed. “What else you want to do with me?”</p><p>She shivered and squeezed him, whole body, from his neck to his hips to his cock still inside her. “I don’t know. You keep coming up with good ones.”</p><p>“We could be really practical about this,” he offered carefully. “I can - uh - find a list online. Things we can do.”</p><p>“Like... the Kama Sutra?”</p><p>He pressed his lips together to keep from laughing; he didn’t want her to shut up now. “No, baby. Kama Sutra is only positions. Not... additional fun.”</p><p>She sat back, staring at him. “Oh.” Her mouth open, closed again. </p><p>“This is a position,” he explained, indicating her body wrapped around his in his lap. “Probably the Lotus or something prissy like that. I don’t know. But what we added to it - that’s additional fun.”</p><p>“Oh,” she said, an eyebrow lifting. She cast a swift look over his shoulder to where James was sleeping against the headboard, and then she settled back in front of him. “Gripping my neck almost until I choke.”</p><p>He clenched his jaw but he nodded. “And.” He circled his hands back around to her breasts, rubbed his thumbs over her nipples. “There are toys we can experiment with. You and I have a thing for your breasts-”</p><p>She laughed, a little gasp of air, and her breasts filled his hands. “You and I?” she echoed. “We do. That - was the first - how you first touched me and I felt it - all through me. Right between my legs so that I really wanted you to reach down and touch me there.”</p><p>“I could do that now if you like.”</p><p>She squirmed in his lap and his cock was finally expelled from her body. But he replaced it immediately with his fingers, and she grunted, her head tilting back, her throat swallowing.</p><p>“What else, Kate?” He stroked his fingers around her sex and then back inside again, the heat of her, the wet warmth. “What do you feel? What do you want to feel?”</p><p>“I want - I want...”</p><p>“You’ve come again and again, baby. This time it should be a little more difficult to get there, you’ll need a different sensation-”</p><p>“More,” she gasped.</p><p>“Yes, love. More. What more?”</p><p>“More... of you,” she moaned.</p><p>He grinned, touching his lips to hers for that honesty, for the raw way she’d said it. He worked his fingers against her front wall, the thick flesh with its ridges, and she stiffened, her breasts jerking towards him.</p><p>“What do you crave, baby? What do you want so badly that-”</p><p>“Everything,” she moaned.</p><p>Overwhelmed. She wanted to be overwhelmed, her senses snowed out by sensation. “When we get some space,” he murmured. “When the bed is our own again-”</p><p>She stuttered on a laugh.</p><p>“I’m going to blindfold you, find all your secret places, touch you all over your body until you don’t know where I’ll be next, what I’ll touch, how I’ll touch you - my mouth, my fingers, my body, my cock against your skin-”</p><p>“Oh, God, oh God-”</p><p>She was writhing now, and he smudged his mouth against hers, working his fingers insistently inside her. “You like that.” He rubbed her front walls with two fingers now, and her body rocked against him, riding his hand. “You wonder what it would be like, all of your senses compensating for having no vision.”</p><p>“Yes,” she gasped. “Yes.”</p><p>“I wonder how many times i can make you come,” he husked.</p><p>“So many,” she moaned, like she had no idea what she was saying anymore.</p><p>“I wonder how many fingers I can push inside you.” </p><p>She contracted around his hand, thighs gripping him, but her eyes flared open and caught on his. “How - many? How many,” she breathed. “Yes, that. I want - want you. Break me open.”</p><p>He groaned and aggressively attacked her mouth, sucking on her tongue and stroking. He used two fingers to stretch her, the tight round hole around him, and she whimpered into his mouth in response.</p><p>He scissored his fingers again and again, widening her, inserting his thumb just to make her feel it, and when she was dripping in slick wet juices, when his fingers squelched with every stroke, he angled three and pushed inside her.</p><p>She cried out, but he swallowed the sound of her, broke away from her mouth to push back, see the way she took him inside.</p><p>“Look, baby,” he said, his free hand tilting her hips. “Look at what I’m doing to you.” </p><p>She dropped her arms from his neck and leaned back for him, stroked a hand down her belly to circle his wrist, tease the cup of his palm.</p><p> </p><p>“That’s so erotic,” she gasped. “I can feel you inside me. Feel your fingers. Every single one. Fuck.”</p><p>“First time you’ve cursed for me,” he grinned. He pumped his hand and she trembled, her face lifting in that rush of ecstasy.</p><p>“More,” she cried softly. “More. Please, more.”</p><p>He had three fingers inside her and he’d stretched her, but he wondered just how much. </p><p>And maybe the pain of it was exactly what she was looking for.</p><p>Castle withdrew one of his fingers, slowly, and she groaned, her eyes on the sight. He circled his thumb around the bulging peak of her clit and it made her shudder, the muscles in her thighs twitching. He brought all four of his fingers together and narrowed them as best he could - but fuck his fingers were damn wide-</p><p>“Yes,” she gasped. “Yes, please, please-”</p><p>He nudged her sex with his hand, like tunneling into her, pushing aside her swollen sex. She cried out, her grip on his forearm almost unbearable, but her body was shifting around his hand like she was physically opening wider to take him.</p><p>Maybe she was. Maybe it was just the intensity of shoving himself inside her, the sheer fucking power that crackled between them.</p><p>“Fuck me with it,” she groaned. “Fuck me until I break, please - I need it hard-”</p><p>He withdrew only a little and then thrust.</p><p>Her mouth dropped open, eyes going wide, and then her orgasm broke out over her with force. He nudged his fingers deeper, fucking her as much as he could through her climax, feeling her contract and contract and contract around him.</p><p>When she mewled and slumped into his body, her hand knocked into him, tugged him out of her sex, that frantic too much too much as she gripped him by the wrist. She was swallowing hard and fast, and her pulse was pumping crazy, so he wrapped his arms around her and brought her slowly down to the mattress.</p><p>-----</p><p>Kate untangled from his body, slowly, because there was something about unsticking their skin and unjoining that was both erotic and painful.</p><p>To be pulled away from him.</p><p>His fingers lingered on her thighs and fell away, but he was watching her with that lazy, sated languor she loved the most. She couldn't help leaning in over him and pressing her mouth to his lips, lingering herself, until his hand came up and curled at her neck in reminder.</p><p>And possession. No doubt.</p><p>She lifted up again and took his hand, squeezed as she removed his touch. She found her leggings and pulled them on, a little jump to hike them up that made Castle laugh. When she turned around and stuck out her tongue at him, he flicked his fingers in a way that shouldn't have been suggestive but was. And it made her a little hot.</p><p>He was sitting up and buttoning his pants, shifting to the headboard to check on James, so she waltzed in the bathroom to find their other son.</p><p>"Hi, Mommy!"</p><p>She stopped in the doorway, lips twitching with amusement and some mild horror at the sight before her. Wyatt had found her make-up under the sink and drawn eyeliner across the tile - and his face, and the rubber blocks, and the outside of the bathtub. He was sitting on the bathmat in serene contemplation of her lip gloss.</p><p>"Wyatt," she said slowly. "What have you done?"</p><p>"Hi, Mommy!" He raised both hands in welcome and the lip gloss went flying, clattering somewhere behind the toilet. "Uh-oh!"</p><p>"Uh-oh is right," she chuckled. "I'm not sure what your daddy is going to say when he sees this." She knelt down on the rug with him and reached for the top to her eyeliner. She honestly had no idea what Castle would think. </p><p>Worth it was all she was thinking. Worth it to be smashed to pieces on him and pleasantly numb now. Not even the prospect of cleaning on her hands and knees for the next few hours could ruin this jumbled happy chaos.</p><p>"Uh-oh, Mommy," Wyatt intoned. He was reaching for her cosmetic bag and she whipped it away before he could do any more damage. </p><p>"How about we find you some paint and paper?" she murmured, kissing the side of his face. "No more of Mommy's make-up." She was mostly relieved he hadn't chucked her stuff into the toilet. "Wyatt? You hear me. No." She held up the eyeliner in front of him. "Now we have to clean it up."</p><p>Wyatt gave her a solemn look that she wasn't entirely sure she believed. </p><p>"You're gonna help, you crazy boy." She began gathering her make-up and tucking it back into the bag, and Wyatt watched for a second before doing his best to help. She was missing stuff though.</p><p>She scoured the floor but all she really saw were the dark lines across the tile.</p><p>Kate turned to her son, poking his side. "Wy? Where's the rest of it? Where did you put it?" </p><p>She was surprised when he got to his feet and wandered away, but after a moment she realized he was touring the bathroom and finding the rest of her stuff.</p><p>"Smart boy," she praised, holding out her hands for him to pile her foundation and powder and even her lip gloss. "You're very helpful. After you made the mess to begin with."</p><p>There was a commotion at the doorway and then Castle's voice echoed in the bathroom. "Oh, wow." </p><p>She and Wyatt both startled, turning to look at him. Castle was carrying James against his shoulder, and the boy had his eyes open but his head tucked into the curve of his father's neck, just under his chin. </p><p>"Wow," Castle laughed. "Wyatt, my man, you have really gone wild in here. Not a fan of the decor?"</p><p>Kate's shoulders eased and she shared a look with Wyatt, both of them relaxing. The boy held up his hands to Castle, the palms smeared with black eyeliner. "Hi, Daddy!"</p><p>"Well, hi, you turkey." He leaned over carefully and drew Wyatt into him, shifted James, and then picked Wyatt up. Now he had both boys in his arms, and Kate sank back to the cabinets to watch him softly talk.</p><p>She didn't know what he said, but Wyatt gave him an abashed look from the fringe of his lashes. Kate got back on her feet and set her make-up bag near the back of the sink, hopefully out of reach. "I've already told him that he has to help me clean up."</p><p>Castle gave her a flash of his smile. "Sounds like a good idea. Wyatt, you need to help us wash this all off. It's Mommy's make-up, and they're not your toys. Mommy's."</p><p>"My mommy."</p><p>"But these aren't yours," he said patiently, gesturing to the bag. Wyatt's eyes followed. </p><p>"Mommy?" he said, giving her a round-eyed questioning look. </p><p>"Daddy is right. My make-up. Not yours."</p><p>"Urs," he garbled and then kicked out his feet, swinging his legs in Castle's hold. "Urs, Mommy, Daddy, urs."</p><p>"Close enough," Castle chuckled, squatting down to set Wyatt on his feet once more. He stood up and gestured to the bathroom. "I'll grab paper towels and - I guess surface cleaner? What do you think?"</p><p>"Something that cuts grease. But you don't have to. It's my-" fault, mess, kid, responsibility. She didn't finish it, seeing the strange hurt that flashed across his face, and then she hurried to fix it. "My make-up."</p><p>It sounded as awkward and unhelpful as it could be, but Castle only nodded and shifted James to his other hip. "Takes two, Kate." </p><p>And she knew he meant the having sex and ignoring their kids part, but what she heard instead was life. This life took the two of them, had taken his genetics and her own to create the boys and would need them both to keep it going, make it work.</p><p>She nodded back, but put a hand out to stop him from moving. "I'll get the cleaning supplies," she murmured softly. "You have your hands full already."</p><p>"I was going to put him back in bed," he offered, but there was a kind of light on his face that suggested he was pleased with her. Pleased or grateful, it was sometimes hard to tell the difference.</p><p>She lifted onto her feet and brushed her lips against his. "Stay," she told him. "You have the boys. I got this."</p><p>He snagged the back of her shirt as she moved to leave him there, and she paused to glance at him. His face was a confusion of emotions, things she had no name for, no understanding of, but he cupped her jaw and kissed her.</p><p>Thoroughly.</p><p>When he released her, he didn't speak, and she didn't know what the toe-curling kiss was for, but now she wanted only to go right back to bed with him and shed all their clothes. </p><p>Explore.</p><p>But instead she left the bathroom to find cleaning supplies.</p><p>-----</p><p>When Kate moved from the short hall that led to their bedroom and stepped through to the living room, she jerked to halt and had to jump back.</p><p>Wolf raced past her and kept on going, running full tilt towards the kitchen where his toenails clattered on the tile. He turned, skidding on the slick surface, and found no purchase, but he hurtled his body the other direction and ran for the French doors. Even though still the skinny puppy, his legs were long and rangy, his ears flattened to his head, and when he collided with the doors, the glass shook.</p><p>"Wolf!" she commanded.</p><p>He bounded up, coiled his body, and then jumped onto the couch, clawed over the back and down to the wood floor, heedless of her. </p><p>He was going to rip out those stitches, and she was damn sure Wolf wouldn't let Castle do it again.</p><p>"Wolf, heel."</p><p>She chased him to the kitchen where he turned on a dime, back paws sliding, and then he lunged forward again. Only now she was in his path and his body's momentum took him straight into her, knocking him back and almost bringing her down as well. She staggered to one side, caught herself on the marble counter, and turned her head to see him careen off the wall and race to the entry - and up Colin's stairs.</p><p>Shit.</p><p>"Wolf," she cried after him, running now as his paws scrabbled and scratched the wood. "Wolf, stop."</p><p>At the landing, her voice penetrated his wild frenzy, but only long enough for him to turn his snarling bared teeth head her way, and snap his jaws.</p><p>"Oh, no you did not," she growled, taking the steps two at a time to reach him.</p><p>He tensed to jump, but he wasn't a full grown wolf - he was a three month old puppy who hadn't grown into his paws yet. She caught him mid-flight, snagging him around his belly and making his head and shoulders whip forward and back.</p><p>Wolf snarled and gave her a snapping-jawed fight, but not once did his teeth connect with her skin. He got her shirt and ripped a hole in the sleeve, he scratched her thighs through the leggings, but his curved teeth closed on air.</p><p>She hauled him back downstairs, squeezing him fiercely around the middle, wrestling with him every step. She almost dropped him, but she caught his tailbone with her calf and instead gripped his collar - thank God the boys had gotten it on - and she let him lunge-lead her all the way. At the bottom, Wolf's snarls morphed into growls and finally high-pitched, choked yelps that drew Castle out of the bedroom with both boys - wide-eyed, definitely awake, and curious.</p><p>James darted forward.</p><p>"Castle-" she gasped, hauling Wolf backwards by the collar and into her body.</p><p>But Castle had already snagged James by the back of his shirt, and he was bodily lifting the boy into the air and back into his arms. Wyatt stayed put, pressing his body against Castle's leg and winding an arm at his father's knee.</p><p>Wolf lunged like a thing possessed and snapped his teeth again, turned his head as if to bite her. But he didn't. He didn't.</p><p>"Beckett," Castle said sharply. </p><p>"He's gone berserk," she muttered. "He was racing through the house."</p><p>"Berserker is right. Let him go. I'll open the French doors and he can go. He can't-"</p><p>"No, I've got him," she said tautly, digging in her heels and squatting to the floor to counterbalance Wolf's mad lunging. "I've got him. He hasn't bitten me. He can't seem to follow through. I can calm him down."</p><p>James whined in Castle's arms. "James is trying to help," Castle said grimly. "Kate. We just have to let him go."</p><p>"I'm not giving up on him."</p><p>"No," Castle startled. "No, I didn't say give up. No one is giving up."</p><p>"We let him leave the house tonight and we will never get him back," she pronounced. "Those wolves will finish him."</p><p>"Shit. Beckett."</p><p>"He tried to go after them today. He tried and they rejected him and - and that thing - the wolverine? Attacked him and he can't go back out there. What if there are more? What if it's something else that gets him? What if he's just so lonely?"</p><p>"Oh, hell, Kate," he grunted. "Hang on." He snagged Wyatt and carried off both boys, back to the bedroom, leaving her in the kitchen with the wolf. Still lunging, still writhing at the end of her arm where her hand was twined through his collar.</p><p>Castle came back, sank to his haunches at the base of the bar, let his hands dangle non-threateningly. "Wolf the Berserker," he sighed. "He's going to tear out those stitches, Kate."</p><p>"I'm trying-"</p><p>"No, I know, honey. Let me help."</p><p>"How?"</p><p>But Castle was already moving, sliding forward across the floor. Wolf lunged at him and snapped his teeth, but Castle ignored his growls and whines, ignored even the jaws and teeth. Wolf got Castle's pants leg, but Castle didn't even flinch.</p><p>Kate's heart was pounding as she tried holding Wolf back. The animal bit Castle again, and this time she knew his teeth had sunk in, because Castle had to shake him off his ankle as he inserted his legs between her and Wolf.</p><p>And then Castle was using his thighs to bear Wolf down to the ground, pressing and squeezing like a great snake, and Wolf's hind legs scrabbled weakly against the tile, twitched, and stopped.</p><p>"Hold his head," Castle husked. "Honey, do your voodoo thing."</p><p>She shot him a bewildered look, but he was slowly easing his hand to Wolf's flank, beyond the reach of the animal's teeth. She stared down at Wolf who was still writhing to be released, but now his front paws were tangled around her thighs. She eased an arm away from his collar and caught his muzzle with a hand.</p><p>His jaw worked beneath her grip, but his eyes rolled to her.</p><p>"Hush, Wolf," she told him. "It's time for bed."</p><p>His scrabbling continued, moving to get free, but some of the franticness had gone out of him. His eyes remained locked on hers, as if pleading, but she got the idea he wanted to be tamed. He wanted them, and not the pack that had abandoned him.</p><p>She released his collar entirely and cupped him under the jaw, her fingers still keeping his muzzle closed. "It's time to settle. You can do it. I know you're restless. I know you feel alone. But you have us now. We'll have to be enough, Wolf. It will have to be enough."</p><p>Wolf whined in his throat but all of his struggling ceased. His legs still twitched, his body flinching and jerking, but he laid over her thigh and Castle was able to ease up.</p><p>Wolf began to howl, mournful, his eyes on her even as he threw back his head and tried to shake her off. It was a baby's cry, not the low sinister sound of the full grown wolf. This sound was full of yips and anguished noises, and even Castle let out an uncomfortable breath at the howl. </p><p>She didn't let go, wouldn't, but she stroked his fur and called his name, drew his whole body into her lap to comfort him.</p><p>After a while, Castle backed off. He touched her foot and squeezed. "I'll clean the bathroom. You stay with him."</p><p>-----</p><p>Wolf was drowsy and limp in her lap when Castle came back into the kitchen. He had changed into black sweat pants that clung loosely to his hips and his t-shirt was green; he brought the scent of pine and lemon with him.</p><p>Castle stopped at the threshold, sank down to his haunches and then crawled to sit beside her against the cabinets. Wolf didn't even flinch, merely raised his eyes to Castle with his head firmly in the crook of Kate's arm.</p><p>Castle laid a flat hand palm out, Wolf licked his fingers, and Castle began petting the dog's muzzle. "He's doing better."</p><p>"Mm. What about you?"</p><p>"Bathroom is all cleaned up. I made Wyatt help me, though I think he enjoyed it a little too much to call that punishment."</p><p>She smiled tightly and gestured with her chin to his leg. "I meant that. He got you."</p><p>"Barely."</p><p>"Not barely, Rick. I saw you shake him off."</p><p>Castle studied her a moment and then shifted forward, hiking up the pant leg of his sweats. Two marks. Crusted blood. Which Castle flicked with his thumb and they both crumbled to nothing but smooth - if hairy - skin.</p><p>She stared.</p><p>"You're the only one in any real danger, sweetheart."</p><p>Kate let out a helpless laugh and Wolf yipped at her. She lifted his cradled head to her lips and kissed him between his eyes. "You're lucky my family heals so fast, you dumb dog."</p><p>Castle's lips twitched and he leaned in against her shoulder, started petting Wolf again. "Wolf the Berserker. Never thought it'd be you."</p><p>"Be him?" she murmured, drawing her knees up a little to better hold the wolf.</p><p>"Naw, nothing, sweetheart." He turned his head to her and kissed her lips. "A little taming of the shrew."</p><p>She gaped at him for that comment but he only grinned and kissed her again. She slapped at his neck with her free hand and he chuckled, caught her by the wrist and kissed her harder.</p><p>She grunted at the attack of his lips, tongue, groaned into the feeling of his assault. He shifted to put himself higher than her, pressing her down now, dominating. She surged up into it and made the dog yelp as he got crushed.</p><p>"Whoops, sorry," Castle said, pulling back. "We'll chill out, Wolf. Mom went to all this trouble to get you quieted down."</p><p>"Mom," she snorted.</p><p>Castle and the dog both looked at her.</p><p>"Fine, mom," she sighed. "But that makes you dad."</p><p>"Already am," he shot back. His lips softened, his eyes. "Thank you for that. Making me - letting me be their dad." His fingers caressed the side of her face and dragged across her lips. "My warrior woman." </p><p>"Castle," she whispered.</p><p>"No," he hummed, withdrawing only enough to offer her his help. "I know you've got a different story told in your head. But that's the one I'm telling my sons, the one I'm telling you. The real story of how amazing you are."</p><p>And he dragged her and the wolf to her feet, straight up.</p><p>-----</p>
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<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Chapter 6</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She carried Wolf like a baby into the bedroom, as awkward and gangly as he was. She wasn’t looking forward to the day when he was too big to lug around, but then again, she couldn’t imagine not being able to carry the boys either.</p><p>But it would happen.</p><p>“They’re both in bed,” Castle said quietly. “Wyatt did good work. Fine motor skills came in handy.”</p><p>“He’s asleep-?” But she saw the moment she moved to the bed that Wyatt wasn’t asleep. He was curled up like a wolf pup with his brother, but he lifted his head and made grabby hands for her.</p><p>“Wuff.”</p><p>The dog wriggled in her arms, though she wasn’t about to let him down. She did have Castle’s help to climb into bed, and then she scooted back to the headboard in the only space available.</p><p>“Yeah, not happening,” Castle muttered. “Wyatt, come on. Mommy and Daddy sleep together. You sleep down here.” He reached in and grabbed Wyatt by an arm and a leg, hauled him down the bed. Wyatt giggled and flopped to the mattress, crawled away from Castle and under her calves.</p><p>“Move James,” she said, nodding to the boy. “But gently, Castle. Let him sleep.”</p><p>“Not sure he’s asleep either,” Castle answered her. He did approach the boy more gently, scooping him up and depositing him with his brother. James whined and curled up again, turning his face away from the light.</p><p>Kate leaned down and patted his bottom, flung the edge of the throw blanket over him. It went too far and dropped over his head and he giggled in a sleepy kind of way.</p><p>“Whoops,” she chuckled. “Sorry, little bear. I covered you up.”</p><p>Wyatt wriggled his bottom as he scooted back, and then he was diving in under the blanket with James.</p><p>Castle rolled his eyes and climbed into bed with her, sat shoulder to shoulder against the headboard. He nudged James - or it might have been Wyatt - with his bare foot, his toes curling and digging into one of the boy’s backs.</p><p>A giggle came out from under the blanket but they both stayed where they were. </p><p>“Let them,” she said, waving Castle off. </p><p>“Boys, you want your stuff?” he said, leaning forward and pulling a bunny and a rag doll from under his ass. She laughed and the blanket peaked, a head coming up - an arm? - and Castle tucked both under the blanket.</p><p>“Loveys,” she murmured.</p><p>“What?” Castle turned a shocked glance back at her, arrested in the middle of straightening the blanket. “Is that... I mean, I know I say a lot of shit, but-”</p><p>“Say a lot of shit?” she interrupted, confused by the look on his face. </p><p>“Hang on. What did you say?”</p><p>“Loveys?” She gestured to the blanket, shifting Wolf to her thigh. “That’s what they’re called. The bunny and rag doll. Well, originally both rag dolls. I think Wyatt saves his for special occasions.”</p><p>“They’re called... love what?”</p><p>She grinned, realizing now. “You thought I was calling you a lovey? Oh, Rick, that’s kinda precious.”</p><p>His cheeks flamed as well as his ears. “Shut up.”</p><p>She carefully removed an arm from Wolf and instead wound it through his, tucking in close to Castle. “You’re cute. Lovey.”</p><p>“Shut up.”</p><p>“Aw,” she murmured, softly kissing his cheek. “You can be my lovey, if you really want to.”</p><p>“Shut it,” he muttered back, squirming. “What’s a lovey anyway. Fucking hell.”</p><p>She grinned and traced her finger down his ticking jaw. “Comfort object. Like a blankie or teddy bear or doll. I made those because they - had to learn.”</p><p>“Had to learn?”</p><p>She sank her cheek against his shoulder. “Learn to comfort themselves. Without me.”</p><p>Castle tensed. “Shit.”</p><p>“Yeah,” she sighed. “Shit.”</p><p>His hand cupped the side of her face. A kiss at her eyebrow. “I’ll be your lovey,” he said quietly. “Too long comforting yourself, baby.”</p><p>Well, that wasn’t what she’d meant. But.</p><p>She turned her nose into his shoulder and pressed her forehead hard into him. “I was just worried about them. Not me.”</p><p>“But they had each other,” he said, kissing the top of her head. “They had each other. When we came into their room, they were both in the same isolette thing.”</p><p>“Yeah,” she sighed. “That’s true.”</p><p>“And what did you have?” he whispered. “That’s not rhetorical, honey. Did you have anything at all for comfort? Found you in a thin, scratchy t-shirt and leggings. A sweatshirt. The damn bed was stripped to a sheet and-”</p><p>“I had me,” she interrupted. “And plans. I had plans. As poor as they were.”</p><p>“Well, you’re here and not there, so they weren’t poor. You planned and you made it. You killed that son of a bitch and freed all of us, Kate, so yeah. That’s a comfort.”</p><p>“Not to me.”</p><p>There was a long silence and Wolf struggled in her arms, making her lift her head and shift to let him get comfortable again. When he had settled, she stroked the top of his head with her fingers, over and over, watching his eyes droop.</p><p>Castle leaned in against her side, drew his arms around her, completely winding himself around her. She huffed, surprise catching her off-guard, but he already had her, his body encompassing hers. His kiss landed on the exposed skin of her shoulder, his teeth scraping.</p><p>The blanket had moving bumps, the boys playing, and she watched them distractedly, clearing her mind of the rest of it.</p><p>“Will you tell me the plan?” he said quietly.</p><p>“You saw it.”</p><p>“Tell me anyway.”</p><p>“You know what I did.”</p><p>“Tell me, Kate. The plans you had, your only comfort in that place.”</p><p>She wriggled her shoulders, squirming. “You’re too-” She swallowed and shook her head but Castle was wrapped around her. “It’s not as dramatic as all that-”</p><p>“I found you soaked in blood, a scalpel your only weapon, after having gouged out a dead man’s throat. This really fucking is that dramatic.”</p><p>She grunted, tightening her arm around Wolf. “I can’t say that wasn’t in the plan,” she answered finally. “I had - really vivid dreams about killing him.”</p><p>“Cold comfort,” he sighed.</p><p>“Kept me warm enough.”</p><p>He huffed, like he had laughed, and when she turned her head to glare at him, he was trying to smother his grin. “Sorry, I’m sorry. This is serious. I know. I just feel the same damn way. Sometimes that intensity is all that keeps you warm. Fight another day, Beckett. God knows that’s familiar.”</p><p>She studied his face, remembering all over again that this man was a covert agent, an assassin, who had faced so much more than she had. “Will you tell me?”</p><p>“Tell you what?”</p><p>She shrugged, frowning into the space between them. “What’s kept you. All this time. What plans you had or - I don’t know. Maybe. A woman? Colin had that girl...”</p><p>“The prostitute. You think I had a prostitute like Colin?”</p><p>She flushed. “No. I don’t know. Did you?”</p><p>He huffed. “No. Beckett. No.”</p><p>“But - did you have anything at all?”</p><p>He opened his mouth to respond, but then nothing came out. He just stared at her. </p><p>He’d had less than her, then, because she at least had her mother, the hope of her father, nineteen years of support and encouragement and the love of a family. The idea that one day she would get it back.</p><p>But she hadn’t.</p><p>She had made - found? - this instead. And she was damn bad at it, that was for sure. </p><p>But she hoped it was warm enough for them both.</p><p>-----</p><p>"Well, there wasn't a whole lot of time," he explained. His fingers snagged in her hair and stayed.</p><p>She had her head cradled on the concave slope of his ribs, a pillow under her shoulders, her body splayed diagonally across the king sized mattress. James and Wyatt had both fallen asleep, though James had curled up at her hip while Wyatt was draped over Castle's shin. Wolf was in the tight space between Castle's chest and her shoulder, his nose buried in at her armpit.</p><p>For some reason, he liked her sweat. Whatever.</p><p>"How long were you there?" she asked softly. Their voices threaded in and out of the dim light that came from the bathroom nightlight. She wasn't able to sleep, and Castle apparently rarely did.</p><p>"Four months," he answered. His fingers started up again, combing through her hair where it was arrayed along his stomach. She felt his skin flinch and ripple from time to time, so she knew he was aroused by it.</p><p>"Four months is enough time to find someone," she huffed back.</p><p>"Someone?" he chuckled. "Not any old whore will do, Beckett."</p><p>"Why not? I mean, if it's just to relieve a need-"</p><p>"Think about sex, I mean really think about it. What you're doing - taking off your clothes, or well, in our case, opening enough buttons and zippers to pull it out-"</p><p>She hummed, grinning into the darkness. </p><p>"But I'm out there then, a really fucking sensitive organ, and I'm gonna give some random bitch access to that?"</p><p>"And - STDs and stuff, I guess." She had almost said, getting some girl pregnant, but she remembered in time. He couldn't. He'd been sterilized by his father long ago.</p><p>Her heart sank. It was just really damn depressing, the ways John Black had manipulated and used them all, pieces in his game. Poor Rick, to have that taken away from him before he could know or appreciate the choice.</p><p>"Well, so far I've proved immune," he muttered. "These diseases can't attack my cells because the entry code isn't human. Of course, given enough time, I'm sure nature will find a way."</p><p>"No diseases at all?" she murmured, turning her head on his stomach to glance at him over Wolf.</p><p>He tapped a finger against her forehead. "So far." He scratched her scalp and used his free hand plump his pillow under his neck. "You know viruses and the like - you know how they work?"</p><p>"I had high school biology," she said. "Well, and that one semester at Stanford. So yeah. Basically."</p><p>"Well, they replicate using a cell's own nucleus, right? But in my body, they can't hijack the nucleus because they can't get past the cell wall. My proteins are shaped differently."</p><p>"Huh."</p><p>"And my mitochondria - which some call the battery of the cell - that's set up to eliminate free radicals that usually damage the cell, and also make it age. Which has the added benefit of destroying invaders."</p><p>"You sound like you've memorized a child's cartoon," she smiled. But her brain was stuck on make it age. And what that might mean. "You won't age?"</p><p>"I won't - ha. No. I age. Free radicals age your cells - they put like a stopwatch on their life span, which causes cell death. Over the course of your life, you're constantly making new cells. But some cells are limited run, and as your body gets older, it's harder to produce non-faulty, perfectly functioning cells. So my body chemistry has been altered to eliminate that stopwatch as much as possible. It's not a youth serum, and I won't live forever, but the damage done to my cells is so minimal that things like cancer or cell death or mutations -- those don't happen."</p><p>"Huh."</p><p>"Too much?"</p><p>"No," she said faintly, her mind buzzing. "Just thinking."</p><p>He combed through her hair slowly. "Bad thinking?"</p><p>"No, babe." She lifted her hand from Wolf and reached back, caught his fingers and tangled hers. Their clasp came to an awkward resting place over her shoulder, her elbow against Wolf. "Not bad."</p><p>"I've never talked to someone about this - outside of my brothers. Someone normal. What it means for-"</p><p>"I'm normal?" she snorted.</p><p>He squeezed her fingers. "You had normal. You watched tv as a kid. You know enough to say I sound like a cartoon."</p><p>She froze. "I didn't mean it like that."</p><p>"No, I know."</p><p>"I meant - it sounds like you were told this spiel when you were seven or eight and you memorized it, made it into a kind of bedtime story. Fights invaders. Differently shaped proteins. I don't know."</p><p>"Oh. Well. I guess you're right. That's how it was explained to me when I was nine."</p><p>She relaxed again, released his fingers so he could scratch through her hair. He seemed to need the repetitive motion as much as she did, petting Wolf soothingly. </p><p>Or maybe he was just soothing her, not himself.</p><p>"You and your brothers talk to each other about all of this?"</p><p>"Not as much as you might think. When we took the MRIs in the city, that really was the first time much of it was out in the open. All those experiments done on Ben and Alex... we never talked about it. We pretended it wasn't happening."</p><p>"Too painful," she murmured. "Who wants to keep that horror alive by bringing it up over and over? I don't."</p><p>"Is that why getting you to talk is like pulling teeth?"</p><p>"It's over, Castle. It's done. But if I keep dwelling on it, if I put words to what was done to me, then it just - fuck - it makes it alive. I want it dead."</p><p>"The therapists always told us that giving words to an event is releasing it to the universe. It's no longer this unnamed dread inside you, but you've mastered it. You're given the power over it by saying its name."</p><p>"Like Rumplestilskin?" she laughed.</p><p>"What?"</p><p>"A fairy tale," she sighed. "Never mind."</p><p>"It's not a fairy tale. It works. I've done a lot of terrible things, seen a lot of terrible things, but after every mission, I come back and I sit in front of the debrief team and we go back through all of it."</p><p>"Debrief team?"</p><p>"A panel. For CIA work, it's a therapist, two guys my pay grade, and one guy above me. I write it down first, I read my statement in its entirety, and then they ask questions. It works. Really should give it a try, love."</p><p>"I don't want to read shit to a panel."</p><p>His fingers scratched. "No, I mean. Just me. You don't mind telling me things, do you?"</p><p>"I... don't hate it. I don't feel like I want to claw your eyes out or shred my own skin when I talk to you. But it's not easy to give life to the shit he did to me."</p><p>Castle's fingers went still. She sighed, wishing she hadn't said even that much, but slowly his thumb trailed a line across her forehead.</p><p>And then down her nose.</p><p>Her mother used to do that. Make the sign of the cross over her. She had been very small, but her mom's fingers had been wet, dipped in water at the front of the church.</p><p>She couldn't fathom Castle doing that.</p><p>"Kate."</p><p>Her name in the darkness, the tenderness of his mouth on that sound, calling her name - it made her curl onto her side, her knees bracketing Wolf but her eyes on Castle.</p><p>He tilted his chin down to study her. "I think what my father did to you - it already has life. You said it. It's living inside you. You want it dead, well, words are weapons, Kate. Take back control. Murder it."</p><p>She let out a shaky breath and closed her eyes, the haunting, daunting idea rising up in front of her.</p><p>Take back control. Words as weapons.</p><p>She felt mute.</p><p>Defenseless.</p><p>"Not tonight, Kate." His palm came to rest heavy on her head, curving over her ear. "Doesn't have to be now."</p><p>She nodded, the heat of one of her sons at her back, the Wolf at her stomach, Castle under her ear.</p><p>She kept her eyes closed, reveling in the full dark.</p><p>-----</p><p>“I was in Thailand,” he started suddenly. Quiet, as if testing the night.</p><p>She turned her head and looked up at him, and his fingers resumed their stroking. She hadn’t been asleep, but maybe he had thought she might be. “In Thailand,” she prompted.</p><p>“With Colin. We had an assignment, this Korean Ninja.” She saw his lips curl in a grin. “Well, that’s what we called him. Not his name - code name, that is. We tracked him down and eliminated-”</p><p>When he paused, she curled a little closer on her side and nudged her forehead into his hand. “Go on. You killed him and then?”</p><p>“I killed him,” he murmured.</p><p>Oh, shit. “Castle. It really won’t do if we’re both having existentialist crises here. You be solid. I can’t be right now.”</p><p>He let out a breath and scratched at her scalp. “Fine, fine. Let me know, would ya?”</p><p>She grinned against the rise of his stomach, shifted her shoulder so she could get more comfortable. “So. Thailand. Korean Ninja. I suppose he was a foreign spy?”</p><p>“He was a foreign assassin,” Castle clarified.</p><p>“Well, then - you know - a little justice in that,” she encouraged.</p><p>He sighed. “Then I should expect to die by the sword.”</p><p>“Oh.” Her chest tightened. “Please don’t do that.”</p><p> His fingers curled in her hair, possessive, and he lifted up onto his elbow, his abdominal muscles hardening under her ear. His body practically wrapped around her in a strange and somehow comforting embrace.</p><p>“I’m not dying. Not now. You’ve seen what I can do, baby, and more you haven’t seen. No way in fucking hell I’m letting anything keep me from you.”</p><p>She let out a shaky breath and squirmed in his captive hold, pushed on his chest to let her breathe. He sank back to his elbow, studying her, and she waved him off, turning onto her back to stare up at the ceiling.</p><p>His hand came to rest at the top of her head.</p><p>“Get on with the story, Castle.”</p><p>“Yes, ma’am. Colin and I are in Thailand, in the city of Bangkok, which is the largest and most densely populated city in the country. Five million people crowding those crazy streets and a shrine every few feet. He disappears on me - which, knowing Colin, I don’t think anything of - and I’m mostly just observing.”</p><p>“Observing what?”</p><p>“You know - just - life? The people on the street. How they wear their clothes, style their hair, the sound of their language and the language of foreigners. Krung Thep - that’s what they call it. I don’t know how we got Bangkok from that, but anyway, the whole of Siam culture is right there.”</p><p>“Is that anything to do with Siamese?”</p><p>“Yeah. Siam was Thailand. A native of Siam would be Siamese.”</p><p>“Huh, then how did we get those Siamese twins from that?”</p><p>He grunted, tugging on her hair. “Baby, not the point of this story.” </p><p>She growled.</p><p>“-But,” he went on, “I happen to know that one. First record of conjoined twins were native to Siam. So they were literally Siamese. And so the name became synonymous.”</p><p>“Mm, synonymous.” She squirmed until her shoulder hit his side, shifted her arm up to trace her fingers under his shirt. “You have some pretty words, Rick Castle.”</p><p>“I think you’re making fun.”</p><p>“No, baby.” She lightly scratched a line along his ribs. “I’m weird like that. But keep going. Bangkok. Siam.”</p><p>He chuckled in the darkness. “Not weird, sweetheart. Happen to find that fucking hot. I’m usually the only one who wants to know.”</p><p>The only one.</p><p>She pressed her palm to the span of his ribs, and he resumed his comb through her hair.</p><p>“Colin finds me at this temple and he drags me down to a place called Khaosan Road. It’s where you can get cheap as dirt accommodations. All the college kids, the backpackers, they are crawling all over this place because it’s so cheap. Everything is on this short little stretch of city block. It’s like home base - people leave from there, come back to their hostel, that kind of thing. But then on top of that - shit - it’s a free-for-all marketplace.”</p><p>She could actually picture it in her head, just the way he talked, the energy in his words, the color. He went on, describing the scene, barbecued insects and grilled local fruits, the language flooding around him, the taxis and press of people, the intense ping pong games taking bets like a boxing match, the bars overflowing, the backpackers shoving through and stopping at every stand, the neon and the nightlife and the ways a man could disappear.</p><p>“And then Colin pulls me into this pretty swanky hotel. It’s not one of the international chains, but you can see it’s trying to compete. More than just a mattress in a cinder block box. It’s luxurious but in a desperate way.”</p><p>She could envision that too - the velvet sofas whose cushions had been crushed by repeated use, the gaudy gold drapes, the immaculate central lobby with shining marble pillars flanked by garish sculptures.</p><p>“And I find out quickly it’s not really a hotel, but a whorehouse.”</p><p>“A whorehouse,” she laughed, tilting her chin up to see him in the faint glow of the nightlight. “Oh, Colin.”</p><p>“He’s dragging me over to these three women. They - well, they look alike to me, and I say something like, triplets? And Colin laughs at me, introduces these women.”</p><p>“Names?”</p><p>“Baby, they were made up. One was Candy. I swear.”</p><p>“Candy,” she grinned. Of course.</p><p>“We head upstairs, and I’m telling Colin this is unnecessary, it’s not on task, and that we have to make the rendezvous in under four hours.”</p><p>“Oh, baby,” she sighed, stroking his ribs with her thumb. </p><p>“Colin said I had to start living a little. I told Colin he lived a little too much. But he shoves me into the room and one of the girls comes in. And I-”</p><p>She waited, but he grunted and rubbed a hand down his face. Rubbed his eyes.</p><p>“Castle?”</p><p>“It just occurred to me that this might not be something you want to hear.”</p><p>She pressed her fingers into his skin. “I’m interested. It’s life. What it was like for you. Besides, I started it. I asked you about all of this.”</p><p>“Well.” Castle dropped his hand back to the top of her head, paused again. “You know they call it the Banana Pancake Trail.”</p><p>“What?” she laughed.</p><p>“In Asia, Southeast Asia, these places that cater to Western tourists, backpackers, they’re called the Banana Pancake Trail. Obviously because banana pancakes are one of those typical food items for the area, their culture’s supply trying to adapt to Western demand. But it’s not just food vendors, it’s hotels and shops and everything. That’s what that place was like, what that girl was like. Trying to fit her mouth around a Western paradigm.”</p><p>Kate bit her lip and glanced up at him. He was staring into space as if remembering, analyzing all over again. “Baby, that’s really the fanciest way to say she sucked you off.”<br/>Castle’s stomach tensed under her. “She didn’t - fuck, she did. That’s not what I meant. Even though she did. I just wasn’t excited. I never get excited for it. It’s just one more thing to have to do, one more element to the job I need to accomplish.”</p><p>She watched him as he talked, the bland resignation on his face, as if he’d long ago learned the world didn’t work for him the way it did for everyone else, and more than that, he just couldn’t see getting worked up over it.</p><p>Kate raised on her elbow and he glanced at her, stopped talking.</p><p>She lifted her hand from the dog and eased away from the little boy at her back, and she slowly, carefully slid her knee across his hips.</p><p>Sank down to his groin.</p><p>“You’re definitely excited now,” she murmured, snaking her hands under his shirt to skim up his torso. She squeezed her thighs and felt him react.</p><p>“Of course I am,” he growled. “I’m never not excited around you.”</p><p>“You’re pretty enthusiastic about it,” she said, lowering herself to her elbows, a kind of sphinx sit on top of him. It let her rub her legging-clad groin against his. Swivel her hips.</p><p>He groaned softly, head tilting back. “This is the first time - in my entire life, my whole damn career - where I can’t control myself. I want you all the time, Kate.”</p><p>“Never been like this before?”</p><p>“Oh, God, no.” His hands clutched at her hips. She glanced over her shoulder to be sure certain little boys were still asleep, and then she crawled and squirmed her way higher on his chest.</p><p>Castle was staring down at her, breath heaving in and out of him so that she rose and fell with the motion. She could just press her toes into his crotch and rub.</p><p>“Fuck,” he whispered.</p><p>“Are you telling me,” she murmured, hovering above his mouth. Her fingers stroked his cheeks, his stubble, the twist of his lips where he was trying to hold it together. “Are you saying that no other woman has ever made you want them?”</p><p>“Just you. Want you. Fuck me, Kate, fuck, I need you.”</p><p>She flexed her foot against him and his hips jumped.</p><p>“You’ll have to let me do the work,” she whispered, touching her mouth to his. “You have a baby asleep on your shin.”</p><p>“Ah, fuck.”</p><p>She eased her hand down into his pajama pants and closed her fingers around his enormous, throbbing cock.</p><p>-----</p><p>“You’re doing such a marvelous job of keeping quiet,” she murmured at his mouth.</p><p>He huffed, but it was more like a groan, and she swallowed it even as she widened her thighs. </p><p>“And so still,” she breathed, fingers circling his cock.</p><p>His nostrils flared. She was teasing him against her while he held her panties to one side, and it was the best feeling in the world, this man trembling with such leashed want. It was potent, her body perched above his, her hips swiveling to slide her wet arousal over his cock.</p><p>And he was so hard. He was so intensely hard. His fingers dug into her ass where he gripped the material of her panties, while his other hand clutched the back of her neck. </p><p>“I love it when you think you’re in control,” she whispered. “Gripping my neck, my ass, like you think you can make me.”</p><p>His eyes flared open and sought hers, a burning connection. She shifted her hips over him, let him feel her.</p><p>“Fuck,” he croaked. “I know who has control here.”</p><p>“Mm, is that me?”</p><p>“Don’t prevaricate. You know you own me.” His thumb dug into the side of her neck, that bruise pulsing at his touch. “You literally have me by the cock.”</p><p>She grinned, touched her lips to his. “What did you call it? You’re most sensitive, vulnerable organ?” She bowed over his mouth and circled her tongue inside, darting back again. “A high-value target, I’d guess. Lucky me.”</p><p>He grunted and his hips twitched under her. “Not offering this treasure to just anyone, you know.”</p><p>Kate kissed him again for that, lips to lips, and then shifted back just enough-</p><p>“Ah, fuck, fuck,” he groaned.</p><p>She sank into him. Sank. It was magnificent. The way he intruded, his body pushed inside hers. There was something miraculous about it, feeling his cock thickening, swollen for her, and the way he moved-</p><p>“Ah, hell, baby,” he rasped. “I’m gonna wake this damn dog. The fucking - fuck - the kids. Shit. Beckett.”</p><p>She grinned and sat up just a little, enough to brace herself on his shoulders and rock.</p><p>Rock her hips into him.</p><p>“F-fuck.” His head thrashed on the pillow, slowly, a kind of agonized grind as he tried to keep himself in control. She didn’t want to wake anyone and ruin it, but it was a whole lot of fun to see how far she could push.</p><p>His eyes slitted, his hands gripping her waist, squeezing her between his massive hands so that she was caged by him. She pressed into his shoulders and swiveled her hips again, and he grunted.</p><p>He was watching her. Avidly. Studying her.</p><p>She liked that.</p><p>Kate lifted up, just enough, and snaked out of her shirt, flung it towards the head of the bed. Castle immediately had his hands on her, cupping her breasts and mangling the flesh. She bit her lip to keep from moaning out loud, her head falling back, breath leaving her.</p><p>“Now who’s in charge?” he asked, hips lifting a little so that she felt the flex in his ass where her legs were pressed against him. It drove him deeper, made her quiver in reaction, the shimmer of an orgasm’s beginning.</p><p>She tensed inside, clutching, and he gasped, his whole body thrusting.</p><p>She laughed softly and pressed back down to him, the skin to skin of her breasts against his chest. Holding him down. “Guess I’m still in charge,” she whispered, an open kiss against the side of his neck. She grazed him with teeth. </p><p>Castle grumbled under her, but he kneaded the sides of her breasts where he could reach, snaked his thumbs to her nipples and dug.</p><p>She shivered over him, her whole body, and she braced herself on his shoulders once more to lift up - just enough.</p><p>He was watching her. The moment he had enough room, Castle gripped her breasts, fondling, rubbing, massaging them together. It was exquisite, a point of pain and pleasure that tugged a string straight to the place between her legs.</p><p>She contracted around his cock, clutched hard as the wave came over her.</p><p>Castle went rigid. “Oh, fuck.”</p><p>And then she felt him coming inside her, the way he trembled and tried to hold it back, how desperate he was as he climaxed-</p><p>and her own orgasm spilled her over his body, the rhythm of them together as they thrust weakly against each other for the last of it.</p><p>His arm slung around her shoulders, dragging her down against him. Her cheek to the curve below his neck. He let out a long breath and she sank down with the depression of his chest.</p><p>“Not sure either of us is in charge,” he rasped. His voice was dark and stubbled, rough places that rubbed right between her legs.</p><p>“Not at all,” she admitted, sighing hard into his skin.</p><p>“Stay right there,” he murmured. </p><p>She couldn’t move if she wanted to.</p><p>She didn’t want to at all.</p><p>-----</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Chapter 7</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Do you normally stay up all night?” she said, finally sliding off his chest. She paused and carefully touched Wyatt’s back, but the boy was deeply asleep. “Or is this all for me?”</p><p>“Is he asleep?”</p><p>“Perfectly,” she answered, easing a hand under Wyatt’s neck and starting to shift him. </p><p>“I sleep or I don’t sleep. Depends.”</p><p>“You don’t have to sleep though?”</p><p>“Not especially. I can go for a while before I absolute have to get those four hours.” Castle had his hands tucked into Wolf and was trying to ease him away. “Careful, Kate, honey, he’s falling.”</p><p>“He’s fine,” she said softly, letting Wyatt tumble to the mattress. The boy didn’t even flinch, and Kate grinned up at Castle. “You’re free. Come on. Shower with me.”</p><p>He held out his hands for her and she took them, though it could hardly be said that she was helping him up. He maneuvered over the boys and dog and down to stand with her, and she dragged him towards the bathroom.</p><p>He flipped on the light, switched it back off. The darkness was incomplete, the nightlight working to cast a soft golden glow across the trough sink. Kate turned and pulled her t-shirt back off, dropping it carefully to the tile floor, waiting for it.</p><p>And then there he was, silent at her back, his hands on her shoulders and his kiss barely touching her neck. She tilted her head, eyes closing, and felt his hands skim down her arms and circle them in, embracing her with herself, with his broad body, the heat of him.</p><p>He swayed there with her in the bathroom for a moment, their breaths matched but quiet, his lips at her skin from point to point the only sound.</p><p>His hands released hers, framed her hips, fingers curling under the waistband of her panties. Not at all in tease, she could feel it was more than that, like mapping her. Like learning every place apart from his eyes, from what he could see. Knowing with touch alone.</p><p>She dropped her hands to her panties and nudged them down, and he got the hint, helped her peel them off her legs. She stepped out and felt the brush of his hair against the back of her thigh, and she half-turned, touching the top of his head because he was cute.</p><p>He was handsome, on his knees before her and touching his nose to her knee as he dropped her panties. He came back to his feet and those hands skimmed and framed, planed her sides and smoothed her flanks, came up to her shoulders to curve.</p><p>He liked touching. She liked being touched by him. It worked.</p><p>“Now you,” she said, fingers hooking in the button of his pants, tugging. He nodded as if it was very serious, but he didn’t do much in the way of taking off his own clothes.</p><p>She didn’t mind touching.</p><p>She worked on his button first, popping it through the hole and moving immediately to his zipper. She felt the hardness of his abs, felt the way he rippled at her touch, and she popped her fingers under the waistband of his boxers.</p><p>That got him moving. He removed her hands a little to get at his own pants, dropped them quickly to the bathmat. She stopped his rush with a push at his hips, nudged him enough away so that she could kneel before him.</p><p>His hands came to her head, through her hair; she knew what he was thinking about, and even though she hadn’t been, she was now.</p><p>She tapped the back of his knee and he lifted his foot so she could pull his pants away. But she stayed on her knees and skimmed up the backs of his thighs to tease at the legs of his boxer briefs. Definitely a tease.</p><p>His fingers tensed in her hair, a thumb brushed her eyebrow. She leaned forward and kissed him above his belly button, a little flick of her tongue. He made a noise in the golden glow that pooled around them, and she caught her chin in the waist of his boxers, nudged down.</p><p>She had to use her hands to pull off his boxers; he wasn’t helping. She had all the work but she felt the way his body seemed to go slack, to be under her spell. Like he couldn’t move unless she told him.</p><p>She liked it. </p><p>Liked more the heady darkness between his legs, the musk scent of him, the hair in a thicket at his groin. She leaned in and kissed the side of his balls, pushing his boxers all the way down so that he stepped out of them. </p><p>His cock was thickening. She brushed her lips over it and he hissed, hands gripping her shoulders, a thick knot of her hair. She cupped his balls in her palm and caressed, and his cock rose to touch her cheek.</p><p>She really loved that. The response to her. The immediate excitement, the eagerness that his body couldn’t hide. </p><p>She kissed his cock, little touches of wet lips, and she knew he was staring down at her, she could feel his legs beginning to tremble. She rolled his balls in her palm and touched her tongue to the side of his shaft and he groaned.</p><p>“Kate. Ah, baby.”</p><p>She opened her mouth and swallowed the tip of him, and his knees buckled, his hands shooting out to the shower stall and the wall to hold himself up.</p><p>She swallowed again, working him in her mouth, massaging his balls. He let out a rush of breath and hunched forward, a hand gripping her hair. She let him push her down on him, and then she swirled her tongue around his thickness.</p><p>His growl was feral, echoing in the bathroom.</p><p>She sucked on his cock and withdrew, dragging her tongue at the underside of his shaft. Castle hissed her name and tugged on her hair, gripping her shoulder and pulling her up.</p><p>When his cock came out of her mouth, the bitter taste of his arousal at the slit of his head against her tongue, Castle yanked her up to her feet.</p><p>Kissed her hungrily. Rough tongue and teeth. The force of his want pressing her back to the wall.</p><p>He turned her, popped open the shower door as he pushed her back over the threshold. She flung out a hand to brace herself, but she felt Castle hiking her up, slamming her into the cold tile wall.</p><p>She gasped and arched, Castle’s hand gripped her thigh and put it around his hip. She rubbed against him, reached between them to find his throbbing cock.</p><p>He groaned and buried his head in her shoulder, bit the flesh above her breast. She shivered and rubbed her thumb at his slit to make him shiver too.</p><p>“Fuck, baby, stop teasing,” he gasped. “I need you.”</p><p>She angled him, just right, just right, and he thrust.</p><p>She cried out.</p><p>His cock speared her, shoving against her resistance, hard inside her. She rolled her hips up and he found a rhythm without her, bruising her spine against the tile wall.</p><p>A hand rubbed her breast, graceless, harsh. She curled up, a knee practically under his armpit, her body shoved to the edge, his breaking hers open.</p><p>“You better fucking come. Fuck. I can’t hold off, Beckett-”</p><p>She grunted, flexing as he stroked deeper, a hand up above her head to brace herself against the wall, the other gripping his bicep.</p><p>“Fuck. Beckett. Right the fuck now.”</p><p>She whined, working harder, and then suddenly his mouth came to her breast and suckled. She cried out, starbursts behind her eyes, under her skin, pinwheels and fireworks, and then she was coming, she was coming-</p><p>“Fuck, yes, baby, that’s so good.” He groaned and sank into her, climaxing with force as he rutted into her body.</p><p>Her forehead fell to his shoulder, her hand shaking as she brought it down to palm the side of his face. </p><p>And then he cut the water on - hot, steaming, instantly - and she yelped and came again, shimmering aftershocks that crawled up tight and high and deep.</p><p>“That’s it, baby, so good, honey, so good.” Fingers caressing her face, combing back her hair, lifting her head to see him in the faint darkness. “So very good, Kate.”</p><p>She wrapped her arms around him and he sank back to the bench, holding her.</p><p>-----</p><p>Kate tilted her head back and rinsed shampoo out of her hair, out of her eyes. Castle kept messing with her, fingers and kisses, playing around, and it made her forget what she was doing, how far into the process.</p><p>Soapy fingers caressed her sides. </p><p>She raised her head and saw him stepping in, the rainhead shower coasting water down his face. His eyes were closed but she knew he was watching her between slitted lids. </p><p>Kate drew her fingers through her soaked hair, twisted it into a bun to wring out the water. She bit her bottom lip, watching him under the spray, the thickness of his arms and the width of his shoulders as he scrubbed shampoo into his hair. The water battered his chest, the drops collecting in the shelf of his ribs and abs, down in the coil of his hair. </p><p>He looked entirely too pleased with himself. He knew she was looking.</p><p>She stepped behind him where he couldn’t directly see her, but she didn’t touch him. The long sloping plane of his back, the division of his spine casting two equal wings of rib and muscle. His arms were raised to scrub his hair, but she knew he’d been done with that long ago, that he was letting her look and wondering what she would do next.</p><p>Waiting on her.</p><p>She reached past his body for the conditioner set into the shelf, made the top click loud enough that he heard it. He turned around and tilted his head back into the spray, rinsing the soap, and she could see the suds slipping over his shoulders and down to his hips, collecting at his groin.</p><p>She wondered if he soaped up his cock. Did he wash it with any kind of care, or was it a rough scrub and done?</p><p>Kate worked conditioner into the ends of her hair, her breasts pebbling as Castle studied her in return. She was standing only half in the spray, the heated water hitting her stomach and thighs, just enough to keep her warm but not quite warm enough.</p><p>Castle lowered his arms, scraped one hand through his wet hair, and then stepped forward. He framed her hips and squeezed, shifted her back towards the shower spray. She ducked to avoid the water on her head, let it hit her shoulders.</p><p>Castle stepped back even as his eyes stayed on her. He grabbed the bottle of body wash they were sharing (she kept forgetting to buy her own when they went, or if she had bought some, it was tucked into the linen closet or upstairs with the boys’ stuff, and why did she love that scent soaked into her own skin?)</p><p>Kate finished working conditioner into her hair and stepped back just enough to let the water soak through it. She pushed her fingers through her hair, scratching lightly at her scalp, hurrying now as she watched Castle soap his body.</p><p>She ran her fingers through to the ends, again and again to be sure she had the conditioner out. She rinsed one last time and squeezed water out of her hair, the hank of it around her fist, and she came up to Castle.</p><p>He grinned.</p><p>She ignored his self-satisfied smirk and took his hands in hers, smeared the soap suds off his palms as she pulled. </p><p>She wrapped her soapy hand around his cock, the other at his balls, sudsing his groin as thick as she could make it.</p><p>That too.</p><p>Castle grunted and his eyes fluttered shut, like a girl. She came in as close as she could and still touch him, kissed the underside of his jaw back to his ear.</p><p>She flicked her tongue into his ear and nipped.</p><p>Castle caught her hips in his hands, soapy, slipping, his feet nudging between hers so that he was all clumsy limbs and impatient body. She knocked his hands away and removed her own, and he groaned, a whine coming up in his throat.</p><p>She slapped his shoulders and pushed him back, dropped him down to the bench. His knees were hard-working joints, his thighs wide and thick. His face was drugged, though he gripped the edge of the bench and grit his teeth, watching her.</p><p>Kate came back, knocking between his knees to get close enough, and then touched his cock again.</p><p>Half-bent, it put her close to him, and his mouth opened, sucked at her skin. She shivered and sank down to one of his knees, her sex splayed open wetly on top of his thigh. His cock was responsive in her hands, rising high from the nest of his groin, the thick, kinky hair that snaked past her fingers.</p><p>“Kiss me,” he said roughly, catching her chin and jerking her eyes up to meet his.</p><p>She released her bottom lip and surged into him, kissed him with all the aggression bottled in her at the feel of his cock. He groaned at her assault and caught her hair in his fist, angled her head where he wanted it.</p><p>She worked his cock between them, rough here too, abrading his flesh with her ferocity.</p><p>He cursed into her mouth and his fingers found her, their arms colliding and tangling as they fucked each other. Their kiss was teeth and and sharp tongues, the grip of fingers in counterpoint.</p><p>He stiffened first, his fingers hooking hard inside her, but his orgasm erupted between them, the spray of his come hot and lovely. She sucked on his bottom lip and rode the sharp edge of his fingers until her own climax came dizzy and sudden and beautiful in the humid swirl of the shower.</p><p>-----</p><p>She scrunched her hair in the towel and caught his eyes in the mirror as he passed behind her. He had a comb in one hand, but he was scraping his fingers through his hair instead, drops of water flicking against the mirror, at her skin.</p><p>She dropped her towel and knew he was watching her too, the nakedness of her body and the shine of water on her skin. She found the stack of clean clothes perched on the edge of the bath tub and she withdrew a t-shirt. </p><p>Castle’s hands came to her hips and his kiss touched the side of her neck. “Mm, you smell like me.”</p><p>She shivered and pressed the shirt to her torso, turned in his light embrace. He kissed her lips and she let him, dwelling in it for a moment, before they broke apart and glanced at each other.</p><p>Eyes and lips upturned and his fingers rubbing softly against her hips. He stepped back and took the stack of clothes from the rim of the tub, began to dress for bed once more. She pulled on the t-shirt, smiling to herself when she realized he’d grabbed one of his own black shirts for her to wear. No secret then, her love of being surrounded by the dark male scent.</p><p>She knew it was psychological, that it was the comfort of that first moment she’d pressed in close to him, knowing it was within her power to have everything she wanted and needed. Things she hadn’t even known she had wanted, things she could take now.</p><p>With him.</p><p>His fingers sank into her hair at the back of her neck, tugged lightly. “Come out into the bedroom and I’ll comb it. Sit with me?”</p><p>It was both the typical Rick Castle remark - this is how it will go - with that layer of vulnerability on top - if you’ll let me. She wasn’t sure he knew he did it either, that he showed his belly to her, bared his throat, every time they had sex. He had a kind of pathetic, sweet way of cuddling up to her afterwards, his gratefulness mostly unspoken.</p><p>And maybe that was why she believed in it. Why she didn’t doubt the stories he told her about his other encounters, not when it came down to it. She might have trouble believing that no one had ever made him excited, physically, but she believed him when he said no one had ever done it for him.</p><p>He was just too happy over her. Her. For him to be this puppy-adorable and wolf-feral over her meant that he at least believed it to be true.</p><p>“Kate?”</p><p>“Yeah, yes,” she said quickly, coming back to him. He looked concerned now, worried over her, but there was no distrust in his eyes, no wariness even though she still knew he ought to be. </p><p>She could do anything to him, and he was vulnerable and puppy-sweet enough to let her. Roll right over and give her the knife as well.</p><p>He reached out and gripped her elbow, tugged her sharply into his body. His pajama pants were really a pair of loose sweats, a misshapen grey t-shirt that clung to his shoulders and floated loosely at his hips. She ran two fingers under his shirt and scratched lightly, trying to reassure him that she was in control of herself. </p><p>For now.</p><p>He kissed her, a roughness to his touch that belied his well-controlled desperation for her. She tasted it anyway, the sense of his longing, how he couldn’t bear to stop touching her, how he wanted so much for her she still couldn’t handle.</p><p>“Do you mind?” he whispered at her lips. “I want to - to help. You always get sleepy when I brush your hair.”</p><p>She shook her head softly and cupped his face in her hands. “No, baby, I don’t mind at all. Just got lost in my own thoughts.”</p><p>“Bad?” he mumbled, as eager to please as one of the boys, and just as clingy in some ways.</p><p>“No. Not bad,” she murmured, kissed his frowning mouth. “Thinking about you, love. And how - good I feel. How-” She shrugged and stroked her palms down his cheeks to his neck, his chest, pushing him away a little. “How good you make me feel, and how surprised I am to feel it.”</p><p>His arms snaked around her and lifted her off her feet, his body pressing into hers at all those hard points. </p><p>When he let her go, she slid down his body and then took his hand, and the comb, and pulled him out to the bedroom once more.</p><p>-----</p><p>She was getting tired now that he was brushing her hair. She was basically sitting in his lap,  her knees drawn up to her chest so she could lean forward and rest her cheek. He combed her hair down her back, always touching, the fingers of his free hand working through knots and laying her hair flat against her shoulders.</p><p>She was getting tired. But she didn’t want to dream.</p><p>Sitting in his lap, her butt bones hitting the heels of his feet, there was just so much warmth to fight against. The heat of his body emanated out from his skin and soaked into her, while the heavy touch of his fingers, the rhythmic strokes of the comb all conspired against her.</p><p>Her eyes were closed. She wasn’t sure when she’d let them fall shut. Her eyes were closed and he felt good at her back, and she wasn’t shivering any longer. Her knees kept shifting as she relaxed, jostling her awake just enough.</p><p>Castle put the comb aside; she heard it clatter at the bedside table, felt him shift behind her.</p><p>“Lie down with me,” he said quietly. “Like this.”</p><p>She was already a drawn up ball in his lap, all he had to do was wrap an arm around her middle and unfold her as he eased down to the mattress. They had one slice of the bed left to them after boys and dog, and now she was being balanced practically on top of Castle.</p><p>She pushed her legs down to tangle with his, sliding under the sheet. He had her pressed to his chest, and she slumped into him, half on her side, half on him.</p><p>He straightened her hair down her back, untangling the wet strands with patient fingers. She could feel his lips against the top of her head, stealing kisses as he propped his neck with their last pillow.</p><p>It was so hard to stay awake.</p><p>“I don’t want to have bad dreams,” she whispered.</p><p>He didn’t answer and she didn’t even know if she had said it out loud or if it just rattled and crashed inside her head.</p><p>Castle’s fingers danced at her nape, untwining hair, rubbing at her skin softly. “I know. I’d guard your sleep myself if I thought I could prevent them.”</p><p>“No, don’t,” she mumbled, shifting, trying to look at him. His grip on her skull was tight, heavy, holding her down. “Don’t. You need to sleep too. Be fast enough to stop me.”</p><p>“Stop you?”</p><p>She was so heavy. Her head felt funny, lying on his chest, hearing the thump of his heartbeat just after her own, as if he were waiting for permission.</p><p>“I can’t always tell when you’re having a nightmare, so it doesn’t do much good. Besides, the ones I can tell - you’d wake me with those anyway.”</p><p>“Don’t wake you,” she sighed. Her lips were numb. Her body unknotting, cord after cord. His fingers still played with her hair, deep strokes.</p><p>“I’ll do what I can, love.” A brush of lips. “But sometimes nightmares tell us where the trouble lies.”</p><p>She whimpered and his arms came protectively around her.</p><p>But she was already sliding off, dragged into nothing.</p><p>-----</p><p>“Mommy?”</p><p>Castle swam up.</p><p>“Mommy.”</p><p>Castle shook off sleep in moments, just in time to catch James before he could poke his mother in the face with his grabby little hand.</p><p>“Shh, hush, Jay, let Mommy sleep,” he murmured, shifting onto one shoulder to grab the boy. </p><p>He lifted James into the air and carried him over Kate and into his own chest instead. He turned to put Kate to his back, shielding her from the awake little boy. But James didn’t seem that awake; he laid down against Castle’s arm and settled in.</p><p>He stroked the top of James’s head, kissed the boy’s temple. “Why are you awake?”</p><p>James’s eyelashes brushed Castle’s arm, but he had no answer. Castle turned, craning his neck to look at Kate, concerned that the boy had gotten some kind of sense from his mother that things weren’t okay. But Kate was deeply asleep, too deep for dreams, since her eyes weren’t moving under her lids.</p><p>He turned back to study James who had nestled into the crook of Castle’s arm and curled up.</p><p>Huh.</p><p>Castle lifted up and glanced down the bed to check on Wyatt and the wolf. They were back to back at the other side of the bed, almost at the foot, Wolf’s legs twitching in sleep.</p><p>Castle sank back down to lie with James, putting a hand to the boy’s back. Sixteen months old, and looking less and less like those vulnerable little babies he and Colin had carried out of there. </p><p>James wasn’t falling back to sleep. In fact, his body was tense and tight against Castle’s arm, his gaze studying Castle’s face.</p><p>“Hey, what’s wrong?” he whispered. He darted in to kiss James’s forehead and the boy flinched.</p><p>Castle sank back to the pillow and shifted until he could get both arms around James, cuddling the boy, hoping it helped. James was still tense against him, and Castle tried to keep his touch soft, gentled, no sudden movements. But James wasn’t falling back to sleep any time soon.</p><p>Well, the kid had been trying to get to Kate, right? </p><p>“Gotta be quiet, let Mom sleep,” he whispered. “But come on.” Castle turned slowly in bed, taking James with him, until he faced Kate again. He settled James between them, bringing the boy back against his chest.</p><p>He was afraid James would reach out and cling to her, wake her, but James didn’t do that at all. He just sank back into Castle, his whole little body melting at the sight of Kate before him.</p><p>Castle sighed, laid his hand at the top of James’s head, nestling his chin down into the boy’s. “Oh, baby. I’m sorry.” He had assumed he’d be enough, but of course he wasn’t. He wasn’t Kate. He wasn’t their mother, the one they had fought for. “You told me you wanted Mommy, but I wasn’t really listening. Here she is. See? Here’s Mommy.”</p><p>“Mommy,” James whispered.</p><p>“We’ll make sure you always have Mommy, okay? We’ll do our best to keep Mommy here.”</p><p>“My Mommy,” James mumbled. His eyes were beginning to droop.</p><p>Castle shifted them both just a little bit closer, and now James’s fingers unfurled and reached - and he could touch her, if he wanted to, but he didn’t touch her. He just hovered there.</p><p>“It’s okay. You need to touch her, you can do that.” Castle curled his thumb into James’s palm and nudged the boy’s arm to extend. James’s fingers came to Kate’s bent elbow and the boy shivered and sank into Castle’s embrace.</p><p>James patted Kate’s arm, gentle little touches, and then he went still. Castle glanced down and saw James had fallen back to sleep, just that fast.</p><p>Kate wasn’t the only one living in nightmares. Castle couldn’t forget that they had all gone through this. He had a whole little family here, and they needed his protection - but they needed him to be smart about it too.</p><p>He wouldn’t keep the boys from her, just as he wouldn’t keep her from the boys. It was all a delicate balance, but he was up for it. He was a super spy after all.</p><p>-----</p><p>Kate woke to dog breath in her face and a boy slung over her hips. She cracked open an eye and saw the wolf asleep beside her, his muzzle tucked up under her chin. Lifting her head a little, there was Wyatt sprawled over her thighs. She had no idea how any of them had slept through that.</p><p>But they were the only ones in the bed.</p><p>She shifted and slowly rose up on her elbows, scanning the room. “Castle?”</p><p>“Hey, right here.” He hurried out of the bathroom with James in his arms. Both of them looked showered. “We were gonna make breakfast.”</p><p>She cracked her jaw on a yawn and James laughed. His little face was lit up with it, and she rubbed a hand down her mouth, struggled to sit up.</p><p>“No, stay. You stay until breakfast is ready. Take your time. Looks like Wolf had a good night with us.”</p><p>She glanced to the dog curled tightly beside her pillow. “Mm, yeah. First night indoors. He did good. Did he wake you at all?”</p><p>“Wolf? Nope. Not at bit.”</p><p>“He’ll want out as soon as-”</p><p>“Kate,” he said, a little firm, a little exasperated. “I’ll let him out when he wakes. You - stay right there.”</p><p>She scowled at him and he came closer, leaned in over her with purpose etched into his face. His kiss was rough. </p><p>“James wants to make you breakfast in bed to celebrate our good night. So lie down and let him.”</p><p>“James, huh?” she muttered, but she caught the side of his face with her fingers, rubbing against the smooth skin of his cheek. He had shaved and showered and all of that without her.</p><p>“Maybe me,” he whispered. His kiss was softer. “Maybe I want to make you breakfast in bed, keep us all together for a little while longer.”</p><p>“All of us?” She dropped her hand as he lifted from her again. “Too many little bodies when all I want is your body.”</p><p>He shot her a hot look and came back for another kiss, rough, and she felt Wyatt stirring in her lap. </p><p>“Go, go,” she whispered, shoving Castle away. “Make me breakfast before the rest of the rabble rouses.”</p><p>“Alliteration,” he grinned. His thumb rubbed the bruise at her neck. “Sexy.”</p><p>“You know what’s sexy?” she said, catching his thumb and kissing it. “Having the bed to ourselves.”</p><p>He groaned softly and James clung to his shirt as Castle came in hard again, his kiss a snap of teeth and a harsh abrasion of his tongue. She hummed and opened her eyes slowly, closed them again when it just went on and on.</p><p>She really loved kissing him. She really loved pushing him so hard he couldn’t stay away from her.</p><p>“Breakfast,” he said gruffly. “And then we’re fucking. I don’t care how or where-”</p><p>“Yes, sir,” she grinned. “Now go.”</p><p>Castle did, a lot more reluctance in the set of his shoulders, but he took James with him. Kate laid back against the mattress, dragging his pillow under her own to prop her up, and she dropped a hand to the boy, a hand to the wolf.</p><p>Wyatt’s hair was soft and silky between her fingers, Wolf’s fur was short and stiff. </p><p>Breakfast in bed to celebrate their good night.</p><p>It really had been a good night. Amazing.</p><p>-----</p>
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